Kerry - Well safe is a relative term.
Love the latin...
C3N - Tension is good - what we are aiming for. As for a few days... try right now.
Thanks and enjoy.
Katharyn
Title:
The Sidestep Chronicle – Second Chronicle - Cruel and Kind. Strong and Gentle (Part 140)
Author: Katharyn Rosser
Feedback: Constructive criticism is always welcome.
katharynrosser@hotmail.com Flames just demonstrate you have a tiny mind.
Spoiler Warning: Pretty limited. The story occurs in an alternate universe as set up in “The Wish” though reference is made to events that occur in both realities. Nothing is referenced that occurs after S5 though. Guess why? Most “spoilers” would be for the first chronicle of this fic rather than the show and if you haven’t read that then much of this will make no sense but you can try and get round it by reading the preface to Part 104 which summarises most of what went before.
Distribution This story was written for Pens. Pens is its home. No archiving off Different Coloured Pens (This applies to all of the Sidestep Chronicle)
Summary: What the hell are Dru and Darla doing whilst Tara and Willow tramp around in their nest? Well here is the answer.
Disclaimer: I don’t own any of the copyrights or anything else associated with BTVS. All rights lie with the production company, writers etc, etc. I am making zilch from this series of stories. You know the drill.
Rating: R – a general rating for occasional content. Individual parts might be less than this level.
Couples: Tara and Willow forever – others couples as necessary but nothing unconventional.
Notes: There is a story reason for this… we need to see what the vampires are doing – but I just love being in the head of someone dealing with Dru too.
Thanks To: All My Brilliant Beta Readers (AMBBR) Kerry (Forrister) and Jo (Wizpup) who for some reason signed right back up for this fic after seeing the size of the last one. No accounting for madness is there. And Celia (TiredSoul) who should have known better but signed up anyway. *HUGS* and Big Thanks to all of you.
This is one of Kerry’s – and somehow she finds the most occasions to add Python quotes pf anyone I know. It’s always fun, hun.
The Sidestep Chronicle – Second Chronicle
Cruel and Kind. Strong and Gentle.
By
Katharyn Rosser
“
Where are Karen and Suzanne?” Darla asked Drusilla, as if her counterpart would have any idea – or even probably show that she’d understood the question. She had to think of Dru as a counterpart, because she very clearly wasn't an inferior. An inferior would do as she was told. Dru… would do whatever the fairies told her to. Which
might be what Darla told her.
It should have been so very simple. She’d asked for everyone – everyone bar the tunnel guards – to be here for this conclave. What she had to say was always important enough for unquestioning obedience, this more so than usual. They should have been here. As they’d been asked to be. ‘Asked’ in the Order was little more than a euphemism for ‘summoned’ or ‘commanded.’
Instructed even.
Every one of requests was an instruction. Every instruction was a command. They, her vampires, all knew the way things were and they knew the consequences of disobedience.
Of course, since she’d sent Drusilla to deliver that message she couldn’t exactly be confident of it getting through properly and clearly. There was a lot of interpretation involved in understanding Dru. The vampires in the Order – and beyond it – were all terrified of her, and with good reason. Terror was why Darla made the proper use of her – but in no way could you consider Drusilla to be a ‘henchwoman.’ Drusilla, if such a thing could be said of a vampire, was a free spirit.
Dangerous.
Unpredictable.
And absolutely insane, of course.
But, perhaps, this was Drusilla’s subtlety at play. Darla knew she’d been taking the dark vampire for granted recently. It was simply a product of being cooped up down here for as long as she had been. The exercising of power was all that she had to amuse herself, power and Drusilla. Dru could be very, very entertaining when she was in the mood to play. She was perhaps the most fitting legacy of that dear boy Angelus.
A creature so cruel that she could be kind. Or at least appear so.
A vampire so strong she could be gentle. Or at least pretend to be so.
A demon so far over the edge of sanity that she had the most exquisitely accurate insights into the minds and hearts of all creatures in this world they would soon rule. Darla had found herself relying on her… and being inordinately enamoured of the crazy woman’s presence in her court.
The thing was that she’d never seen Drusilla bored… Sometimes she could be off in her own little doll-filled world which frustrated Darla no end, but there was no bringing Dru out of it that was where her mind was. And there were dangers in trying too hard. But the lack of boredom kept Dru fresh – and that was something Darla valued. It was harder to be bored herself when there was Dru here to entertain her – in any number of ways.
She’d come to expect that recently though. She expected Dru to be there for her – on demand. Just as though she was some other member of the Order.
Dru was much more than that.
Drusilla was bound to her simply because she wanted to be – unlike all the rest of them. There was respect there, which might simply be because Darla had sired the vampire who had sired her… but there was no loyalty to the Order of Aurelius as such. Such things didn’t interest Dru at all. Organisation… A woman who could count the legs of all the bugs in this, the main chamber for hours at a time didn’t much care for power or who had it. She stayed because… Darla thought it was because Dru found her interesting.
Something… Darla enjoyed being interesting. Where Drusilla took an interest there was play to follow. And Dru played in the most delicious ways.
And the other vampire found her amusing, of course. The world amused Dru, perhaps because it was – from her unique point of view – a place which was abnormal in
every way. This vampire’s perceptions were far enough askew that everything must have seemed strange and amusing.
Attempting to make Dru do something she didn’t want to would have certainly turned out badly… Darla had no doubts about who was the stronger physically and in terms of the powers Dru could bring to bear if she wanted to. The alternative was a sulk.
On the other hand Dru had next to no focus – fixation certainly – but not mental focus. A sulk might have lasted very long simply because Dru wouldn’t keep focussed on what it was about. And, through that same flaw, she might have forgotten to summon Karen and Suzanne, sent them elsewhere or, perhaps, tortured them to death.
Next time, Darla promised herself, she’d definitely send a flunky rather than a dark queen to deliver her messages. That was how the dear, departed William had seen Drusilla and, for once, Darla couldn’t argue with one of his assessments. They had, after his death, finally found some common ground.
Dark Queen.
There was something about Dru… some sort of charisma. Perhaps it was a tiny reminder of her long departed humanity – something that all other vampires missed in spite of the glorious nature of what they were now.
It was… perhaps majestic was the best word. A word that suited a queen.
So very few vampires had any charisma… it wasn't something that carried over from being a human to being a demon. Charisma wasn’t simply a question of physical presence, or memory. It was, as best Darla could tell, indefinable. The word itself was an invention – a catchall term to refer to whatever it was that made one person, or demon, stand out from the crowd.
As a vampire, no matter what you had been in the human world, you had to find your own identity in the new world. Those that failed to do so… they were drones. The Master had found it, Angelus had found it in a different way… She’d never really needed to realise that she’d also found it until after she’d assumed the Master’s mantle… She liked to know there was something there, something which tied her vampires to her.
Fear. Lust. She wasn’t bothered as long as they obeyed her. Immediately and without question. But perhaps not so simple as that?
Certainly she had feared the Master’s power – but hadn’t she also been drawn to it? Charisma was anything which drew others to you.
But Drusilla didn’t even know she possessed that kind of trait. She might even have come over all school girlish and shy if someone told her she did. Perhaps the very real, yet entirely false, innocence was a part of that charisma?
It was equally likely that, once Dru had got over her embarrassment, she’d have ripped their head off.
Every vampire in the nest was afraid of her, including Darla herself, though she’d never admit it, but equally every vampire was strangely drawn to her dark power. Others, from outside the Order, had even come to town to join with Drusilla… Darla had made sure they were destroyed of course.
There was a radiance to the dark queen. Some found it sexual, some found it to be a commanding presence. Still other’s were impressed by the fear Drusilla could instill in
them. Everyone might see something different there.
Darla wasn’t quite sure what it was. For her… perhaps it was all of those things. A package.
It was, then, best described as the indefinable charisma.
If Drusilla had possessed just an ounce of true mental focus she’d be extremely dangerous – in the sense of threatening the entire world… but she really didn’t have that quality.
Dru just didn’t have it in her to spend decades seeking something that would pull this whole dimension down around their ears. So Darla was providing that kind of focus for them both – and the brains in the outfit – for her. Fortunately for the human cattle, she wasn’t too interested in destroying the world…
But together they could be very dangerous – would be and indeed were. All she had to do was to keep Dru focused on her, and then turn herself to whatever was necessary… Keeping Drusilla focused was proving more pleasurable than she would ever have anticipated.
When they had the assembled throng of the Order of Aurelius at their side – and by now they were almost completely gathered – then they would be practically impossible to defeat. And they’d left just enough vampires in the cities she had summoned them from to maintain their positions there. All it was going to take now was some planning and a good massacre.
They were all here – sooner than she would have liked so the number of vampires they’d been able to create for when they revealed themselves were a little lower than planned – but she supposed that was inevitable. Even when she called all her followers to her there had to be certain functions that continued. For example, she knew that a few of the ones who were missing were those that had been assigned to guard them all this night.
And, of course, there were those few who had been left behind in other cities to ensure that their place wasn't usurped by the less deserving. In a few places there had been wars fought with other species of demons to ensure the Order was pre-eminent – or at least well placed. She wasn’t about to give those hard won positions up now. Not even for this. It would have delayed her plans far too much.
There were bigger fish to fry than simply this small town.
Despite all those of her Order she could excuse for not being here – there was also Karen and Suzanne who were… She looked at Drusilla waiting for her explanation – if she even remembered who those vampires were.
“They’re getting something to eat,” Drusilla told her to fill in the blanks.
Eating? Now? When she was about to offer them all the food that they could ever want? All the children they might want to snack on… all the filling, fully grown meals that were out there? It was these sort of impulses that the Master had striven to bring around to his use – rather than simply allowing his subjects to give free reign to them. It was pitiful really. She gave them most of the hours of the night to feed.
Every night.
She provided the food for them to hunt through the tunnels – as pitiful as that was compared to the sensation of a free hunt in the open air – but they still disobeyed her. They couldn’t stop listening to their stomachs.
“And did you even tell them that I wanted them here?” There was really nothing she could do about it now, even if she wanted to. She couldn’t interrupt or delay what was about to start.
Her soul was already damned of course, but she would be doubly damned if she was going to wait for them to finish eating and show themselves. That would simply look weak to the others and she couldn’t afford to appear that way now. It was the whole point of this after all. No one was her equal… not even Drusilla.
They all had to believe that – and live by it. She was the Mistress of the Order of Aurelius and they
would obey her.
Nor was she
actually weak. She would have Karen and Suzanne punished anyway – and not just for how they might make her look before the others. None of the old Order would have ignored the command of the Master. No, their absence was reason enough – even if Dru hadn’t actually told them at all.
It was their duty to find out what her commands were – not to wait to hear them.
“Their tummies were all grumbly and rumbly too,” Drusilla said as if that explained everything. And after a fashion she supposed it did. Hunger was hunger and whilst she wore the Master’s mantle she clearly
wasn’t the Master. She was simply trying to live up to his example – and bring her vampires to the level of his expectations. He might have chosen to restrain the feeding instinct for the greater glory of the Order – but Darla had to admit that she often hadn’t even been able restrain her own instinct to feed in the past. She’d disobeyed the Master herself over food more than a few times…
And, if she looked back now on those few times, he’d almost had her staked out in the sun for it on each occasion. There had to be, as he’d always explained, discipline in any family – but even if Darla had ever dreamed of disciplining Drusilla outside of their more private moments, what would it be for? What lessons could she learn?
Dru was insane… she saw things in other ways than the normal. Including discipline. Besides, as Darla well knew, Drusilla quite liked pain – being on the receiving end of it as well as inflicting it in increasingly weird and wonderful ways.
You didn’t have to be insane to be a gifted torturer, but it seemed to help.
Darla had never quite seen the point of pain if you weren’t inflicting it yourself – or at least witnessing it being inflicted on someone else. Dru… had another viewpoint entirely on that supposition. She had to admit Dru had actually even shown her the other side of the coin and the only thing which bothered her about any of it was putting herself in the position William had once been in… but then she wasn’t addicted to Drusilla as he had been.
So that was all right. She was getting to see, and feel another part of Drusilla, one which that blonde poser had never been touched by.
Ah yes, she needed Drusilla all right – but not for the reasons he had. She wasn’t so weak willed as he’d been.
Drusilla was, after all, one of her main methods of maintaining discipline amongst all of the others – even if Dru couldn’t have seen it as such herself. The Master had been individually powerful very powerful, yet he had used Luke to keep the other vampires in the Order in line.
There was fear, there was loyalty and it was backed by the threat of an immensely old vampire with all the power which it had brought him – and that had been if the unfortunate subject had survived Luke’s delicate attentions. Darla knew she was amongst the strongest of his erstwhile followers, but she wasn’t strong
enough. Not without Dru… There was something special about Dru which no one had ever really identified the nature of.
Like the Master, Drusilla didn’t just have power – she had an attitude, one which others feared. She was unpredictable and she was vicious - even for a vampire. She was, Darla surmised, an unknown quantity to the others.
Perhaps Drusilla was an unknown quantity to herself. Was there any vampire who looked within herself quite as much as Dru? Probably not, and yet Darla couldn’t see that her ‘granddaughter’ knew herself any better than Darla herself.
The fear of being handed over to Dru’s tender mercies helped keep the other vampires in line. Darla had more vampires than the even Master would ever have dared to create – at least in this day and age. The Inquisition had ended the good years of free movement around Europe. Since then, she’d heard, he had been much more cautious then she was now.
But then she needed them – and they
were scattered over and beyond this state. The fragmentation caused problems she’d never really anticipated. The Master had used Luke, and sometimes Darla herself, to enforce his will outside of the ‘family home.’ It was in dealing with those who had been sent away from the heart of the Order that the favourites had shown their value. Now, she hadn’t had that advantage – she couldn’t afford anyone as strong as she was… they would have been a threat.
Unless they were too insane and unfocused to ever be a threat to her control. Unless they were… Drusilla.
But where once her ‘fellows’ would have died at the whim of the Master – she would have done so herself if he had explicitly commanded it – she was reduced to keeping them so directly in fear? Fear was what kept them in line.
Fear of Drusilla.
How many of them would willingly die for her when they were given a choice of simply proving their devotion or keeping their worthless existence? They were no different to how she had once been – she would have avoided death, unless there was absolutely no other choice. In many ways she’d been an inferior member of the Master’s Order.
Yet it was she who had survived to be the new leader of that Order.
Results were what counted.
And there it was. With Drusilla’s power at her command, what Darla had to call a ‘dark magnificence,’ and her own leadership, there were probably quite a few who would now die for her. Despite the low esteem she generally held the members of the Order in, it was now the truth. To avoid being handed over to Drusilla, tortured before they were killed… these vampires would die for her.
It just went to show that with the right motivation anyone would sacrifice themselves for her. And now she
had the right motivation for them. This night though it was a motivation which wasn’t one of fear. It wasn't pain. It was unconnected to Dru. It wasn’t even – strictly – blood. She could finally offer them everything they might have wanted. Everything she had promised them.
It was everything
she wanted anyway, which was all that mattered. Everything she’d promised herself.
They should want what she wanted.
She was
all vampires. She was the Order… the oldest Order in existence. Leader of an organisation which had formed while humans were still scraping around and trying to figure out why staying still and getting a few of their number to grow food for the rest was a good idea.
Before civilisation was raised from the depths of inefficient barbarity, vampires had been simply wandered from hut to hut… a distance of mere miles to humans who might never have met – or warned – their neighbours. Civilisation had, ultimately, allowed vampires to stop wandering the countryside and take their proper places, ruling the night time of towns and eventually the cities. When vampires had subsequently wandered, before the invention of modes of transport which hadn’t bolted at the unnatural presence of a demon, they’d been forced to find caves, or bury themselves in the dirt as Dru was still so fond of doing…
Civilisation and human invention had given them freedom from that filth… from places like this.
And now she was ready to raise her followers to a new kind of civilisation which would free them from these damned tunnels. Freedom from the persistent draught, which rippled through them. Freedom from the perpetual damp, which got into everything. Freedom from the fouling of clothes and shoes no matter how carefully you stepped in the tunnels.
Freedom from the stench of human waste, which would never, ever, go away. She was certain that it was ground into her skin and she’d always – even when she had chosen to surround herself with a cloying pool of the thickest blood – been able to smell it. Humanity….
Civilisation was freedom from the effects, smells and textures of nature at its rawest and most despicable. She was planning to create a world for vampires – gradually of course – which would allow her to be free of everything natural except the blood and the sweetest of things she enjoyed… her views. The perfumed scents which she used to try to mask the sewer. The touch of silk upon her naked flesh. All natural things she could more than tolerate – she even desired them.
And soon they would all be hers.
Okay then, it was time to move away from thoughts of bathing in sweet, but slightly clotting, blood… before she got too deeply into the blood lust and lost control of herself. It always partly clotted unless you constantly bled new humans into the pools – but she’d only had chance to be so self-indulgent once in her existence.
They were still importing the humans, wasting them for fresh blood pools… she wouldn’t have allowed it. But perhaps, once they’d finished tonight – there would be a few hundred people down here who they no longer needed.
She already intended to seek out the finest view in Sunnydale, it was bound to have its own pool… and if it did… She’d fill that pool with the blood of those in the cages. Hunting, after all, would be a free pursuit from tonight.
And so there were a few of her followers missing? Maybe those two chief offenders would die for her too – without choosing to. Had this been a last meal for them? Perhaps. Just perhaps for now. She would wait and see how the rest of the ascent went. She didn’t want to destroy them before the ascent… it would be a waste she might regret. For the want of two vampires, the battle might be lost. If their victory was crushing then she might be magnanimous, she might allow them to live – albeit in great pain.
“Ritual and ceremony,” she said quietly as the throng continued chattering amongst themselves.
Discipline was a much more interesting concept than ritual. She had little use for rituals in their own right – they were simply another method of control. It hadn’t been the same for the Master.
Her discipline was almost ritualistic though. It was expected of her and she fulfilled that expectation. Their expectation was such that if she failed to impose her will they would probably feel cheated by it. As long as they were not the ones she chose to chastise then they were actually happy she was making another of their number suffer.
Sometimes she felt, despite their expectations of her position, they didn’t take her as seriously as the members of the old Order had always treated the, very imposing, Master.
Unlike the Master she was the sire to every one of them though – all bar Dru – which gave her a certain hold on them. And they should have all appreciated that her girlish looks were not a true reflection of what they could expect from her. She’d proven it often enough. When in the Master’s presence, had any of them apart from Drusilla ever known him, they would have been silent until spoken to. Awaiting his pleasure as they should be awaiting hers.
And yet they weren’t.
Instead they were all stood there, and she wouldn’t allow them the comfort of sitting, catching up with each other. Chatting. Some of them had, inevitably perhaps, known each other before she had sent them to other cities and towns. Vampires, she knew very well, loved to brag to each other – especially when they were in competition with each other for her favour. They would be swapping accomplishments, probably revealing what faint praise she had given them for their successes.
The punishments for their failures – and there had been some.
And the upshot of it was that her vampires… those of the most august Order of Aurelius were turning into fishwives. Gossips.
They certainly needed to fear her more. She was standing
right here before them. They could see her and still they gossiped. They knew, perhaps, that she would only turn them over to Drusilla for an
actual crime. Lack of silence wasn't an offence against her – at least so far as they thought – and they were right in that she didn’t have time now. The night was already a few hours old. They should already have been out there – killing for her. That was what she’d brought them here for, so – as the Master would have said – she would forbear her discipline and Drusilla’s pleasure in search of a greater pleasure.
Freedom. Ascending to the surface. She’d almost forgotten what the world, her beautiful world, was going to look like.
Oh, and sending her enemies to one of the various hells.
“Enough of this!” she called out. It wasn’t a shout. But nor was it softly spoken. They should have been silent anyway, more especially at her last words. It didn’t matter though – she’d made her intentions clear to them now. And there was certainly something they wanted to know. They might suspect, but they couldn’t
know what she intended now they’d come from far and wide. They couldn’t be sure why they were all here.
Now.
They had to theorise it was something other than a meeting though. There was a buzz of excitement about them.
Every eye in the place turned to her, and there were still an even number of eyes after the last lessons that Drusilla had taught to her. Now there were two one-eyed vampires… It was a classic punishment and would only debilitate them for a few weeks until the one which had been plucked out was regenerated.
It was a punishment that the Master hadn’t been fond of… he had been more interested in death. But it still worked and was widely regarded as one of the classics. There was something about the eyes – something Drusilla certainly liked. The terror and pain in the remaining eye as her dear, sweet, Drusilla had removed the other had been particularly satisfying. It was good to be feared – even by proxy.
Drusilla was hers – the fear that she brought was, ultimately, fear of Darla herself. She accepted it utterly. It almost seemed natural… as natural as the smoothest of silks.
Fear by proxy, and it saved her having to spend more time than she liked to imposing that discipline on them. Like the Master she was able to stand back and allow someone else, a favourite, to impose the order which was required and because she was detached from it she was able to stand aloof. And, she believed, they showed more respect – the requirement for discipline was less frequent – because they feared her hold over Dru so much.
What was she going to have to do to bring them to, and maintain, awe though? Overwhelming fear of what she could do – at a whim? The Master’s discipline was built, ultimately, on the premise that no one – no one – in the Order was more important than the Order itself. And that everyone – everyone – should be glad to die for him due to that simple fact.
To be killed by or for him not for making a mistake but simply because he judged it to be the right thing for the Order – and thus for himself.
But that level of respect was built on accomplishments as well as simple fear. Yes, she had expanded the Order in numbers and influence but that was a mere matter of applying herself to creating them. It wasn’t an accomplishment and everyone here knew it. There were as many vampires out there, loyal to her, as were in this room – ready to move to take control the cities of this state by night. Soon perhaps the whole Western Seaboard? Then the country… Now, that would be an accomplishment. The Order was already the greatest, in terms of territorial control, that it had been for centuries… Since before her creation – back in the Master’s earliest flush of power.
But the old Order, one that had covered Europe in the dark, sticky, blood had also been one which had been created by the Master. The Inquisition might have interfered with his power, made him head under the ground to await the day he could rule, or destroy, the world, but until she controlled a continent in the dark… then she would never equal his accomplishments. But she could make her start here. Now.
And the start, as her father had told her very long ago - right before he’d sold her to the highest bidder he could find and made her into a whore, was such a tiny thing. Just an inconvenience to get out of the way – but so important.
She’d never looked back on what he’d done – ultimately he’d made her what she was today. The woman, thirteen years after that first night, who’d welcomed death, had been greatly surprised by the pleasures it offered to her. Death had been what had made her. She’d found a new father, a new creature in the Master.
And nothing he’d done to her had been anything other than she’d deserved. Unlike her late, unlamented, natural father. Perhaps not so natural perhaps in what he’d done to his own blood.
But then neither was what she’d done with his blood years later.
They thought she meant enough talking by her words, ‘Enough of this’ – because the voices stopped immediately as the eyes turned to her. That hadn’t been what she meant at all – but it was a desirable outcome all the same. Examples would still have to be made at some point in the near future, but her first instinct – to wait until after they had taken this town and left it running in blood – was the correct one. For now she needed every pair of teeth she could muster. “There is too much ritual and ceremony around here,” she called out to them, taking advantage of the natural acoustics of this place and she saw a different look in those eyes. They had been curious, perhaps a little afraid of her judgement.
But now it was…
Perhaps, some confusion. Where was her judgement.
Perhaps some hope of what was to come.
Certainly there was a lust for the kill. They were vampires after all.
There was still some fear that this might all be a trick… Perhaps they thought she’d brought some imagined traitors here to die? Perhaps they were trying to decide what they might have done wrong for her to suspect them.
There were certainly all sorts of thoughts. There hadn’t been any ritual at all in her Order until she’d decided, and then made it clear that there should be, to continue the Master’s traditions. There was a reason for it. Their strength came as much from
being the Order as it did from their numbers. So, to keep this being the Order and not just some gang of vampires she’d needed to make sure they continued the traditions she’d never really seen the point of during the Master’s long, long night. There was something in that, it had helped them, but then again there was too much chanting, reading from prophetic texts she still didn’t understand or care about.
Just because the Master had done it. He, however, had believed in it all.
Their destiny was now in their own hands… and their hands were
her hands. Each and every one of them – not that Dru had removed any of those recently.
“Play nice,” Drusilla said to her, without even trying to be quiet. “Its what they all expect of you.”
From anyone else that would have been a challenge. From Drusilla it was an invaluable insight – but one that should have been made quietly, or in private. Having Dru actually in the moment the rest of them occupied was surprising enough. Insight, on the mundane level, was strange indeed.
“It
is what you all expect,” Darla noted equally as loudly, forced to acknowledge and respond to Dru but addressing them all as she did so. “But then
I was the one who showed you what to expect. If you want those few words then I will say them. I will bend to your expectations. I will preach to you about ‘the day’ and how ‘glorious’ it will be. But you know that now. Ritual has served its purpose and you understand why we are here. You know that you were created for one thing… To kill our enemies. And I can tell you now that you can bring the day closer by doing just that. Killing is all I require of you to demonstrate your loyalty to the Order we serve.”
And they cheered. It wasn’t the cheers of followers who expected to
have to cheer. Not the cheer of vampires who saw ‘the day’ coming or even food… It was the cheer of those who believed just enough now – and accepted what she had to say because they had that belief. Even though, apart from their numbers here, nothing had changed.
“Tell us what we’ll do tonight?” someone from the throng called back to her.
“Don’t you know?” she asked as if they were children to be led to the place she needed them. She knew that the rest of them would pass the information on.
“We’ll kill!” the other suggested first.
“So simplistic…” Darla said to Drusilla but loud enough for them to hear – deliberately so. She wanted them to feel she was disappointed at their lack of ambition. Drusilla just smiled. She could read the crowd as well as Darla could – literally in many ways. She knew that they had them right where they needed them for this first act of the finale.
At least the Sunnydale finale. This night would mark the end of the war with the Witches and the Watcher.
The rest of the vampires turned on the one who’d asked, the one who’d suggested killing. Yes, they certainly would kill… but they wouldn’t
just kill. Vampires were killers – it was what they did. Why would she need to gather to accomplish that?
“We’ll enjoy ourselves… We’ll take what we want!” another called out to her.
At that Dru descended into the crowd, wagging her finger at the one who’d thought of that little extension to the killing spree they all wanted. “You’re a bad boy,” she cooed. “Speaking out of turn. Naughty!”
Darla smiled at the instant fear that was evident on his face. She could see his eyes following those deadly claws. Claws or not, Dru had such a deadly presence… No one, human or vampire, could be totally at ease in her presence… she thought that might what had been poor William had liked, being on edge all the time even when he should have been able to control and dominate the more childish aspects of her personality.
Even Darla couldn’t relax in Drusilla’s most intimate presence – but that made no difference. She hadn’t ever truly relaxed since the Master had turned her four centuries or more ago.
“You’ll take what the doctor orders,” Drusilla continued. “Milk, honey.” She counted them off on those deadly fingers… “and all the blood you can ever drink. Ruff!”
The crowd of vampires listened, then they wondered if Dru was just being Dru – or was this real? Then they turned to Darla. She could see it in their eyes. Was this really the time? Was this really the day? Or rather the night?
“That’s right,” she confirmed to them, watching their eager, demonic faces. “It’s time for a massacre… but first you have to make sure that those witches are torn limb from limb and their home, their friend’s homes too are burned to the ground.” That ought to do the job – fire was deadly to them, but it was terrible to the human’s too. The pain it would inflict on them. A nice, cleansing blaze would, at worst, leave them their enemies no place to shelter. “And you can apply that to anyone… Anyone who won’t let you into their house… well, you should burn them out.”
Her vampires would be cautious of using the flames, but then what else were they going to do to bring those people from the safety of their homes? Humans had to be shown that the old rules no longer applied.
And where they did… that the Order was willing to work around them.
Some of Sunnydale was going to burn until the humans learned their lessons… Then again that might not be a great thing. Mass fires. Mass deaths. That would mean no people if things got too out of control. They needed homes to stay here in town.
Accessible for the hunts they all wanted so badly.
Perhaps burning them all out was going just a little too far. That was the old Darla – now she had to be disciplined and responsible for the Order – and her responsibility wasn't going to be best served by destroying the whole town. “And they should know it,” she completed without missing a beat as if she’d intended to say that all along.
The humans had to know it – and to know it they had to be alive. She’d let her vampires drink. She’d let them kill. She’d replenish their numbers herself. But they had to leave people alive out there for the future.
“The taste of fear!” one of her followers called out.
“Yes,” she agreed. “They’ll start to anticipate their own deaths again – one way or another. But you may only take one per house. Unless they fight you. Unless they refuse to let you in… or to come out to you. They must learn the lesson. Each house must pay the tithe… one of them must come out and belong to us. Over time they must learn this.”
Starting tonight. But still she didn’t want uncontrolled burning.
“So,” she went on, “one house per block will serve as the lesson. Let the human’s understand the penalty for failing to obey you as you obey me. But don’t let them give you the stringy ones when they do learn… we do want a good hunt don’t we?”
End on the humour. That was important. They laughed – they laughed because they found it funny – and because they know they could do it. They would show the proper restraint now for the longer term gain.
When the laughter faded they were all quiet them for a moment. She knew they would obey, but they were considering what it was they were complying with. Restrictions? She was stopping them from taking anything they wanted? Why?
It couldn’t
just be because she ordered it.
“They’ll learn to be good boys and girls again,” Drusilla reminded them all in her own way.
And she was right. The objective wasn’t just to have a massacre, the likes of which hadn’t been seen here since the Master rose; rather it was to make Sunnydale theirs again. There was no Mayor now. Soon there wouldn’t be any witches.
They’d go out there, they’d feed. They’d kill those that had to be killed – the ones who fought back would be taken first. They’d kill more than that. And… Sunnydale would learn that it had never, really, stopped being the property of the Order of Aurelius. It had been a brief hiatus. The town was still just a food source. There had just been a respite to allow people to breed… to bring the numbers back up to where they should be. That would be the official position – and it was true enough in its own way. The population had exploded in this town after the defeat of the Master.
People felt more inclined to breed when they had security… even if they’d been breeding through fear in the past.
And now those children, like the town and the vampires, were Darla’s.
“You may take the children. The old. But you will leave the breeders for now,” she instructed. “Their fear will make them want each other and their numbers will stay healthy.” She had to think about the long term now. She couldn’t see herself abandoning the power of the Hellmouth until the entire country was hers. If not the continent. There always had to be food.
“And when we’ve marched them up to the top of the hill,” Drusilla continued before her demon manifested itself within her and altered her features, “we’ll throw them off the cliff onto the jagged rocks below and then we’ll lick the blood from the rocks…”
One vampire raised a hand. Darla raised her eyebrows in response. This wasn't a school. “Erm… there are no cliffs in Sunnydale. It has a gently sloping beach but then we’d get sand stuck to our tongues.”
“Well then,” Drusilla responded as she swayed her way over to him, running her deadly nails around the cheeks of the vampires in between and slicing them wide open, “we’ll dig a
very big hole.” To his credit he didn’t scream – which probably saved him.
“O-okay,” that vampire, Jonathan she thought he was called, told Darla, rather than Drusilla, as if he thought that she would save him from whatever Drusilla had planned. Darla had no intention of interfering. “A-A big hole, I can help do that. I’ll take a shovel.”
Drusilla looked down at the ground, as if waiting for him to dig for her. Here and now.
Jonathan looked down as well, guessing what she wanted. “But it’s concrete.” Drusilla just looked at him. “Oc-Okay.” He got down on his hands and knees in amongst the rest of the vampires and Drusilla, with a smile, left him alone.
Darla didn’t really want a big hole in the middle of her chamber… but on the other hand when this night was done she fully expected to have taken a room with a view of her very own. She wouldn’t have to be in this dingy, dank, dirty place anymore. Never again. No, matter how many human slaves she offered extra rations to they’d never, ever, got the last of the cobwebs. They never cleared the scent so she could smell their fear clearly.
And it was always damp.
There was never anything to look at… Her forays into the world outside were curtailed by…
example. She had to set an… example to those others she’d restricted to the underworld. None could rise to the surface without her permission.
She missed the terror she’d inflicted for so long. The brutal pain and the exquisite deaths. It just wasn't the same releasing the humans in the tunnels. The hunt… she knew it was rigged and just the knowledge took all the fun away. A tunnel wasn’t a suitable place to inflict the kind of suffering she’d always so loved up in the world.
Give her a view and a house with plenty of rooms to play in… Close to the hunting grounds.
That would be where she would rule Sunnydale from. California…. She’d be able to look out over it.
The whole country maybe… one night. That would take more preparation though. A half century at least if she wanted to avoid a government problem. She would have to move slow enough not to alarm them – fast enough to make her dream a reality before her followers gained any real benefits from their age which would be in about a century. There were whispers of the government interfering in the dark already. But far from Sunnydale. Cleveland wasn’t somewhere that she had any interest in at all. She’d leave it until last. Perhaps she’d leave it alone altogether – let them have a bastion where they could breed freely.
A place they would see as heaven and try to get to – allowing her followers to pick them off as they travelled. Such dreams, such dreams.
He could dig his hole if that was what Dru wanted. She never wanted to come down here again after tonight.
“You take only one…” she repeated for clarifation, “unless they refuse to let you in. Only the ones I told you. You warn them that they cannot expect anything but the purity of flame if they refuse. Make the example one house per block and make sure the other humans hear the screams.” She needed to reiterate the point – to drive it home. “Then there will be some for tomorrow and the next night – and in their loss they’ll seek comfort in each other. Most of you have never tasted the sweet blood of children…” She allowed that to hang in the air. Appealing to their tastes, their stomachs rather than their sense of logic. Their innate cruelty.
She had no desire to rule a town with no one in it. Aside from having to keep importing food… Well, where was the fun? Power was the ability to kill. To punish. To spare a life for her own purposes and not because she had to. Respect through terror required there to be people to be terrified of her. Not just vampires. A few nights of unrestricted massacre – especially with fires – and there wouldn’t be any left – not enough that the humans would stay. They had to stay – they had to feel the losses were… manageable somehow.
The Master had kept tight reign on that sort of thing and she would follow that example – because it suited her to do so.
No more tunnels. No more cramped quarters with well over a hundred vampires… more so now she had recalled them. Even as their leader she had so little privacy that it rankled.
She’d have a view… a view of a town with flames of warning and terrified humans running into the arms of her vampires… begging to be eaten to save the rest of their families.
Even the Master had never made them volunteer for death.
It was a new level of control and it started tonight. It started with their genuine, heartfelt – if they’d had beating hearts – cheers.
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If I want a little pussy, I got my own to play with.
Chance in
Chance.------------------------
at: 11/3/03 9:48 pm
. And Darla thinks she controls her , well as best as anyone can. hee.. i can't wait. So they are setting up a huge massacre, something tells me they won't get out of those tunnels!
And then everything that had been wrong with T/VW was so right with Will/Tara.