Grave digger, grave digger | October Catchall

[lasergrenades]

Characters: Pepper Potts, Devin Parker, and you!
Date: Throughout October
Location: Around Keeliai
Situation: The spooky happenings has everyone a little on edge, and Devin is having an especially bad month.
Warnings/Rating: Death, possible mentions of violence and abuse. Will specify as needed.


A. [Pepper] KPD | Throughout October | Open

The uptick in crime doesn't leave the KPD extraordinarily busy, but between the rise in illegal activity and the strange, unsettling things resulting from the odd planar activity, things are definitely more tense. Pepper tries to just focus on work, but occasionally she'll do something slightly odd around her desk, such as tossing grains of salt over her shoulder. She does try to keep the superstitions out of the office, for the most part, but the creepy incidents are more distracting than she'd like. Sometimes, she's actually quite cheerful, and begins decorating some areas of the headquarters as though nothing is amiss.

B. [Pepper] Jade Dojo | Mid October | Bakura

Pepper has taken to spending some nights over at Bakura's apartment lately, complete with having claimed one of his drawers for some of her things. The concerns over the planes thinning hang over most of the city, but nothing explosive seemed to be happening, and really she ought to be more accustomed to ghosts and spectres given who she's dating. Lounging around together under the blankets seems like a good option to distract from anything unsettling, especially as the temperature starts to drop since cold weather is not at all Bakura's favorite.

C. [Pepper] Earth Sector | Mid October | Raine

So, ghosts. Yeah. That's-- that's a thing that's happening. That's a thing that's currently happening to her, along with lots of other people in Keeliai, and it's unsettling and scary and also... kind of amazing, in some ways. She hasn't seen her mother since she was six, and a ghost is still better than nothing, and everyone at the house has something going on, so instead of rambling her panic/excitement at Tony and Gene and Bakura all month, she goes to visit Raine. It's been a little while since they've just hung out, and if anyone can help her find some more calm about this situation, it's her friend. She knocks a little hesitatingly on Raine's door, glancing at the redheaded ghost over her shoulder with a nervous smile.

D. [Devin] Sky Sector | Early October | Open

The chill in the air doesn't both Devin at all; England was cold and misty for no small part of the year. The sudden shift is a bit odd, but that was par for the course in this city as far as he could tell. He spends part of his time continuing with his mapping routine, and while he's at it he considers more seriously where he might move to. Devin has very few possessions, so one of the smaller lodgings made available to Foreigners would be ideal. He's more aloof and even irritable, avoiding extended conversations and familiar faces.

E. [Devin] Metal Sector | Mid October | Open

Devin returns to the Metal Sector to test his memory of the streets partway through the month. The tension in the city is evident wherever he goes, and while he's not immune to it, routine has always helped. That is, of course, until he spots two faces he hasn't seen in over a century, and his blood runs cold. He stops abruptly as their attention turns to him, frozen in what can only be described as fear. This is dread he doesn't even know how to hide - so he runs, darting away in a blur and only halting when he's half a sector away and hidden in an alleyway.

F. [Devin] Turtle's Head | Mid-Late October | Open

His family hasn't ceased haunting him no matter where he goes, and now it's all five of his siblings as well as his parents. The sense of calm at the turtle's head helps a little, but Devin keeps away from anyone else who's there, finding as secluded an area as he can. He's shaken in a way he hasn't felt in years and years, and he's giving very serious consideration to leaving the city altogether in an effort to distance himself from it's inhabitants and battle with his panic in peace. If anyone decides to interrupt the spectres currently following Devin with abusive, personal diatribe, they should be prepared to deal with a nasty vampire. See: cornered animal.

(OOC note: Let me know if you want a specific starter, or feel free to write up your own!)

Comments

[iseeall]

"Burning up in the sunlight does sound kind of inconvenient," Leo said, his hand going to his chin. "As for Blood Breeds...not really, but my partner is. He's an exceptionally horrible person and yet somehow we're still friends."

Well, at least Leo grudgingly considered Zapp a form of friend. He suspected the older man liked having someone around he could mooch food off of and blame for things. "Blood Breeds are just scary."

[annihilist]

"Most vampires on my world are affected by sunlight. I seem to be the only one that isn't. Things like garlic and counting and turning into bats are all fiction."

Leo's assessment of his partner was... more familiar than he'd like. "I have to wonder if he's where you've picked up some particular habits," Devin groused, mostly to himself. If Leo's partner was unpleasant, shaking the young man off was going to be that much more complicated.

[iseeall]

"Maybe it has something to do with...why your soul looks so strange." Leo honestly didn't know if what he was seeing was a soul or some sort of energy source, but figured that Devin probably knew more than he did.

However, he made a face at the vampire implying that he shared even a vague similarity to Zapp Renfro. "Hey, don't compare me to that dickwad!! You don't even know how awful he is. Mr. Zapp is a huge womanizer, steals all my food, kicked me in the face on 5 seperate occasions, SAT ON ME, almost set me on fire on 2 other different times!! You're practically a fucking saint compared to him!!"

[annihilist]

Seriously, another person who could see the aspect? What the hell was this place playing at?

He scrutinized Leo for a few moments. That was a particularly vehement reaction, and it gave him an opportunity to avoid the subject of the soul he did not technically have, and what took its place.

"I somehow doubt he's killed quite as many people as I have," the vampire returned blandly. "He does sound like an ass, however. You've clearly learned how to deal with his ilk." In moderately frustrating ways.

[iseeall]

"I don't know, Mr. Zapp's first instinct when someone attacks him is to go straight for the jugular," Leo said, but he couldn't really judge people on the whole killing thing, even if he disliked it himself. Circumstances happened.

And Leo was just a strange kid despite being just a human. "It's given me practice. And if you try to make it a competition I'm not gonna be very happy with you."

[annihilist]

Devin arched an eyebrow at Leo in annoyance. "You assume I care whether or not you're happy with me. I don't even know you. I would accuse you of being arrogant, but I'm not sure that's part of your repertoire."

[iseeall]

"Don't you know anything about common decency?" Leo shot back. He was so done with dealing with people like this. He was done even before he got here. "You don't have to particularly like or care about me, but you can at least not be an ass to someone who tried to help you out."

Well tried to. Leo wasn't sure if he ACTUALLY helped or not, but he at the very least hadn't made the situation even worse as his luck was prone to do.

[annihilist]

Leo was right, and Devin knew it; his behavior was inappropriate, and that was exactly the point. People like Leo didn't need the burden he represented, and he couldn't afford to extend himself into friendship. It wasn't safe. Even if he would forget everything that happened here, even if there were no demons and monsters hunting him, it wasn't safe. Better that Leo think ill of him.

"'Can' being the operative word," he pointed out dryly. "Common decency is arbitrary at best. I didn't ask you for help, and in fact I told you not to try."

[iseeall]

Leo took one big breath. It didn't help. He may not have been privy to the exact reason why Devin was being a dick, but he knew that he didn't like it.

"Hey! It's part of living together in a society! You think you can just waltz around and get off scot free from being an ass because you don't like anyone?!" This was punctuated by Leo attempting to reach up and grab the man's collar, which wasn't exactly a smart thing to do. But he was fed up at this point. "I don't care what you think! I helped because you looked like you were in trouble!!"

[annihilist]

Devin jerked away from Leo's reach, resisting the instinct to slap his hand away and restrain him in the same motion. He was off-kilter, but he wasn't reduced to hurting someone out of hand just yet.

"Ah, so you're allowed to not care what I think, but the same is not true in reverse," he remarked irritably. "Yes, I see, that makes perfect sense. Carry on with your petulant tirade, since apparently my input continues to be irrelevant."

[iseeall]

Well it wouldn't have been as bad as any of the stuff his supposed partner pulled, but right now Leo was too angry to care if Devin thought about fighting back or not. "You're an absolute dickhead! You're supposed to fucking pay attention to whether you're hurting people or not as a common courtesy, or are you saying you just want to turn into whatever the hell your parents thought you were?!"

[annihilist]

On any other day, Devin would have been able to take that and roll with it, because he actually paid quite a lot of attention to whether he was hurting people or not. He did it on purpose, which meant he had to get comfortable at using that pain.

Today, however, his own wounds were exceptionally raw.

"I am already what they thought I was," he replied raggedly. "So there's your answer."

Without another word, Devin turned aside and started walking towards the center of the turtle's shell.

[iseeall]

Something about the way Devin said that hit entirely too close to home, and froze Leo up for a moment, his hands clenched in fists at his side. Really, why did this asshole have to remind him of himself?

"Then why didn't you attack me? Don't give me any of that 'I could kill you at any time' bullshit either. That's already a fact about most people like you. You didn't. And that's the truth."

[annihilist]

Devin paused in his departure, exhaling a shivery breath. His hands were clenched into fists, but more to keep them from shaking than out of anger.

"Because you're human," he said over his shoulder, and resumed walking.

[iseeall]

"What, so if I was like an alien, you'd attack me? Is that really the logic you're going with?" Leo sounded exasperated because he was, and don't think for one second that Leo wasn't following Devin as he walked away. This conversation wasn't DONE, dammit!

[annihilist]

Since Leo saw fit to follow him, Devin just kept going.

"You're alive. I hunt vampires, and that's it. Who do you think turned my family into ghosts in the first place?" Devin's tone was sharp. "Attacking you would go against one of the very few principles I can afford to live by."

[iseeall]

Leo was going to say he was pretty sure vampires were also alive, but he figured that probably wasn't a good thing to say to someone who was already so conflicted with killing them. Besides, maybe his vampires were like zombies or something.

"Well I mean, I can't really judge you for things like that. I don't really like killing either, but I've seen a lot of people die. I don't want to be a murderer myself but I can't exactly yell at my friends for killing things that are a danger to the world at a whole. Which means I'm not gonna judge you either. You seem to be doing a fine job of that on your own."

[annihilist]

Devin gave a single, sharp laugh. "I don't recall inviting psychoanalysis. I was born a monster, and I can't change that fact. All I can change is what direction I'm pointed in and try to balance the equation a little bit."

It would have been easier if guilt had failed to dig it's claws into him, but for some reason he had never moved beyond the point of caring. He wasn't sure why, and he'd rationalized that it was only fair punishment, like the scars he'd accumulated.

[iseeall]

"Hey, I'm not psycho-analyzing you! I just know a thing or two about feeling worthless." His circumstances were a lot different from Devin's, but there wasn't a day that could go by where he wasn't reminded that the price of his cowardice has been these eyes. Even if Klaus had...that's right! What Klaus said to him!

Well, it probably wouldn't work on Devin being as stupid and stubborn as he was, but it was honestly what had made Leo stop and think, that maybe somehow there was a part of the world that could accept him and that he was useful. That they wanted him around.

"Mr. Klaus said something to me once when I first met him. Like....when I was sounding a lot like you. He told me as long as one faced towards the light and took even one step forward, that means the human spirit could never, truly die. You're not running away from where you're going and-" Leo took a breath before he got too emotional. "You may not be human, but you certainly act more like us than you do your vampires."

[annihilist]

The arrival of his family had apparently left Devin more raw than he realized, if Leo could read him so well. 'Worthless' was putting it mildly. He was too much a vampire to ever be human, and too human to ever be considered a true vampire - he was somewhere in between, in an endless tug of war.

But there was an irony in that statement that Leo couldn't know. Devin could hear the emotion in the young man's voice, hear how much he believed what he was saying. Light was what had landed him in front of the firing line, and occasionally saved him from the bullets.

"You've done your due diligence," Devin sighed, continuing to look at the distance he was walking towards. "Rest assured I understand your point, possibly better than you realize. I release you from the burden of responsibility you seem to think you have."

[iseeall]

He wanted to feel hopeful; he wanted to feel like Devin finally listened to him, but it somehow at the same time it felt like the guy was just dismissing him again. "I don't have any obligation! I just don't like seeing you be so hard on yourself when there's no reason for it."

Leo's short legs had a harder time keeping up with tall people, but thankfully HSL was a good place for aerobic training. "Do you really get it, or are you just saying that so I stop bothering you?"

[annihilist]

The vampire's jaw tightened for a moment as he bit back an angry reply. There were so many reasons for how he treated himself, albeit not all of them rational.

"Those things are not mutually exclusive," Devin pointed out. "I can understand something and not act upon it." Or agree with it. "And even if I hypothetically wanted to, the results of a century of war cannot be undone with a single platitude."

[iseeall]

There were many reasons that Leo hated himself too, even if he knew they were stupid and unreasonable. It felt unfair that people like Klaus had such faith in him when Leo couldn't even convince himself or this person that either of them had worth but well...he couldn't run away.

"I wasn't expecting you to act on it. Or something. Mr. Klaus said that to me like a year ago and I have a hard time believing it still, but if you don't have a person to say that to you, it's the least I can do to try and help." Years of self loathing didn't vanish. He knew that, gods he knew that, but he didn't even know if Devin was listening to him or not.

[annihilist]

It was admirable, what Leo was trying to do. Devin simply wasn't in a good place to hear it at that moment - although if he's told the same thing enough, it might start to stick. Someone would need to be incredibly stubborn for that, and incredibly patient.

He let out an irritated huff. "Strange as it may seem to you, allowing myself the luxury of that line of reasoning will only create problems." Or rather, it could, but believing himself to merely be a monster among monsters actually made his job a lot easier. Giving in to the hatred took less energy than always fighting it off. "Go spend your time with someone who won't waste it."

[iseeall]

"Oh yeah sure, sorry I was bothering you from going and sinking yourself into depressive thoughts on the side of the street," Leo said. He may have been stubborn but patience for idiots wasn't his....okay, well he had to deal with Zapp. That took a lot of patience.

"Sure, just keep acting like hating yourself is gonna let you do your job better. I'm sure the other vampires won't capitalize on that at all. Girls love the angsty brooding type anyway. I'm sorry for reminding you that other people exist in this world."

He'll kick your ass, Devin.