SPPA Chronicles (Sarre & Nix)

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"Pah, chickens, all those are good for is eggs and dinner." Asmara spat her opinion. "My friends here are special, not just anyone gets the chance for one."

Abruptly, the older shifter started to chuckle, a dry sound, and rare. "Well that explains a lot. Stephan can talk a building into crumbling. He's a wretch of a human. Now, don't think that I hate all of you, cuz I don't. I hate everyone equally, but he's a lecherous piece of slime. He'll take anything you say, twist it around seven or eight times and then spread it like butter on bread." Shaking her head, she glared at a couple of passerbys.

"If you want to know anything here, you talk to me, maybe Kelin. But I'm cheaper than he is. I'll make you a deal, girl. You been me excellent coffee for a week, and I will agree to be your informant as well."
 
"Chickens are surprisingly good cuddlers," Eleanor slipped in.

When she learned the cost of Asmara's information, she couldn't help but just laugh. "I'm sorry," she said, "But you know, since I got to the SPPA, I've been having impeccable luck. It's like perfect circustances just lay themselves at my feet. Clearly, I've still got it." She looked at Asmara with a sly grin. "My mother farms coffee back in England, and she roasts it herself, in a roaster my father custom designed for her. Every month, she sends me a fresh pack, and I grind it every other night," she said, "I'll get you the best damn coffee you've ever tasted, Asmara."
 
"I'll hold you to that. We have boring coffee here but it's better than that bitter colored water Xyne drinks all the time. Nasty stuff, but it's not his fault, he has no taste." Waving one hand back and forth, she tilted her head, eyes narrowed. "I've seen a lot around here, good and bad and a large hot mess in between. I'm old, and set in my ways, it's the only I can get things done my way around here. You'd do well to find something that works for you and no one else."



By the time Xyne was finally able to get away from Stephan, he had heard every possible rumor under the sun. Impossible things too, Like Rebekka the vampire being the father of Linda's baby. Shortly after that, one someone had called tot he manager, and Xyne took the opportunity to vanish into the crowd, making his way to Asmara's stand, and hopefully sanity.
 
"Oh, hold me to that. Please do," Eleanor grinned. "My mother used to win awards, back when those contests were still held. I'd ask if you remembered, but she wasn't big enough of a company to afford entry into the global contests. Just a little greenhouse in the English countryside. She was impressed, but still baffled when she found out I wanted to do more with my weird abilities. Perhaps you and my mother would get along."
 
"Bonding over coffee, ladies?" Xyne stepped in deftly avoiding one of the cages, focused mostly on adjusting his sling.

"What did you do to yourself now?" Asmara crossed her arms, looking stern.

With a grin, he leaned close. "Well, I was walking down the road see, being my usual charming self, and there across the way was this lovely redhead..." He chuckled when she smacked him on his good arm. "Just work, Asmara."

"Men." The old shifter huffed, but seemed almost pleased. "I like this one, you should keep her."

"She's not a pet, Asmara...."
 
"Yes. You wouldn't understand," Eleanor said. Then she laughed. "Liar," she said, "We're all pets until another class graduates into the office." She nodded towards Captain Tristis. "But he's one of the better ones, Asmara. In the office, I'm the paperwork hamster. He got me out of that, at least."
 
"I think it was the first time anyone ever wanted me to give them an order..." Xyne gave a one shoulder shrug. "Not that I really do much ordering around."

"Well, with your last few lazy, good for nothing but looking pretty and smelling bad partners, I'm not surprised. It was probably easier to do it yourself." Asmara hobbled back to her chair, settling into it with a quiet sigh.

"No, please tell us how you feel, really. Sadly, as much fun as it would be to talk to you all night, we still have some stops to make."
 
Eleanor sat back, letting Officer Tristis handle whatever this was. She didn't want to call it an interrogation; too light for that. Maybe questioning.

She wasn't even sure what they were looking for. General news? Signs of unrulyness in the area? Perhaps it was because she was new, but the market at this hour seemed gentle and free and happy. Not at all a place for murder; though she supposed that technically, murder could happen anywhere.
 
"Fine, fine, go off and leave an old woman all alone with no one to talk to. I'll have to find someone else to tell about the rogue attack earlier." She let out a dramatic sigh.

"If I find one, I'll be sure to leave her alone." Xyne followed almost the exact same thing every time he came. Asmara would complain for a while, Xyne would say he had to leave, and then she would tell him something interesting. It was almost like a game the two played. In the end, it worked out, because Asmara got some company and Xyne got information. "How many?"

"I dunno. Couple ran through just after the sun set, three two nights ago, and one got hauled in before that bloodsucking friend of yours just after the last time I saw you. Two shifters bought the farm." She tapped her cane on the ground, glancing at Eleanor. "Watch yourselves."
 
Eleanor glanced at Captain Tristis, trying to study his expression. It was difficult, so she just listened to Asmara speak. A fight, it seemed, could brew from the investigation of this unruly pair. She wasn't sure how to feel about that. Did fewer fights make an SPPA officer smarter? Or did it just make them a coward. She supposed it depended on who one asked.

Once again, she was wearing only the smaller set of her batteries, but they were no longer in the werewolf district. There was light here, and power surged from multiple outlets. She'd probably be fine.
 
Xyne really didn't want to deal with any rogues tonight. Honestly, he just wanted to have a nice simple patrol, with no surprises, no attacks and no bullshit. Those nights were pretty few and far between but, he had a crappy week and he'd earned one. Honestly, he was going to shoot the firs tthing that tried to attack him tonight. No questions, no hesitations, just a simple shot, whether it did any damage or not, he would FEEL better.

"Thanks, Asmara. As always, you are the only person here with any sense." His smile was slightly strained, but the shifter didn't hold it against him.

"Don't you let anything happen to the girl, here. She promised me the best coffee I've ever had for a whole week." She waved her cane at them both. "Don't you forget now."
 
"Of course not," Eleanor said. "I'm proud of my mother's coffee. Can't wait to see your face when you try it."

"Why are rogues rogues?" she asked Tristis, when they had left. "In the textbooks, they simply said that they're homeless, jobless, and physically powerful, but the more I think about it, the more I think that's outdated. The officers were always more interested in problem-solving and combat."

It wasn't Captain Tristis that answered her, but rather a silky voice that came from behind them.

"Because we hate the new world," it said. "And we especially hate you people."

They both turned around. The vampirism in the man that stood before them was obvious, almost as if it was a costume. He wore mostly black, accented with red, and his hair was slicked smoothly back. She could see a spark of light glinting off of it. Of course, he had the pale face, and his smile was made to show his fangs. All he needed was the cape.

A vampire dressing up as a vampire. Eleanor could appreciate the irony.
 
For some reason, the rogue, standing there all full of self importance, made Xyne actually snicker. He honestly couldn't help it. It was doing nothing really but making the rogue look even madder, and Asmara look at him like he was crazy. But with the light on his slicked hair, all Xyne could think of was the sparkly vampires in that God awful book Lil read.

"How dare you laugh at me!" The words were hissed, venomously, full of affronted hate now.

"I'd laugh at you too." Asmara snapped, eyes glaring. "I've warned you before about showing up at my stand. I may be old but I am more than capable of stabbing my walking stick through you." For a couple of minutes, the rogue and the shifter just stared at each other.

"I don't have the time to waste on and old thing like you." The sneer was expected, "You though, I'll enjoy draining every drop of blood from you, and your pretty little friend." Abruptly the rogue vanished, planning to kill the two easily once they left.
 
"Oh great," Eleanor said, when the vampire had left. "I smell the possibility of my first real fight. So much for diplomacy."

Discreetly, almost as if she were just scratching, she shifted the positions of the little wires that protruded from her batteries, as well as the wire-packs latched onto both of her wrists. It wouldn't do if either decided to stall on her. All of this, she did through her coat, feeling the metal and plastic underneath the surface of the pleather.

She couldn't help but smile a little. Back at training, there had been a running joke that Eleanor preparing for a fight would involve a dramatic tossing aside of the coat to reveal the hardcore awkward, lumpy gadgets she wore underneath it.

Her father had promised her a more compact battery pack that could fit her like a strap of mingun clips. That was two years ago. It was probably another one of his abandoned projects.
 
"What the hell is wrong with you? You never laugh, and at a rogue? Have you lost what little sense you had left?" Asmara, was glaring at everyone and everything. She hated being referred to as old.

"I couldn't help it. I honestly couldn't. He looked like one of those vampires from that horrid little set of books Lil loves so much." Eleanor was right, there would most likely be a fight later, and it was all on Xyne. Still, he had a feeling if the situation replayed it'sself he would end up laughing again.

"Go on, both of you. Go chase that rotten little shit down and give him one for me." Obviously dismissing them both, the shifter moved toward the back of her stall, almost immediately going back to her work.

"Sorry, Baker."
 
"Would have happened sooner or later, Captain," she said. It wasn't as if she could just openly criticise him, but she silently thanked Asmara. Perhaps Tristis had weaknesses in acting. In any case... there were more pressing matters.

"So... do we just start chasing him on foot? Or do we wander till he ambushes us?" She asked him. "And what should I expect?"
 
Secretly, he was planning on blaming the pain pills of everything. He was even sure he would spin it and it actually work. Maybe...

"I think we should go out like normal. I'd rather have a fight on the street than have on in here. Too many people. So lets just pretend that nothing happened, keep our guards up and take care of anything that might happen." It wasn't exactly the best plan, and it wasn't like they could actually move fast enough to chase the vampire if he really did decide to run. An ambush was likely, hell it was practically certain, and really they didn't have that much of a choice.
 
"Sure," she told him. The fact that she was deriving more confidence from her own convenient abilities more than her captain and partner troubled her a little.

They walked briskly through the crowd, searching for trouble in emptier streets. A few times, she found her eyes darting towards sources of sound, but more often than not, her gaze fell on ordinary, happy, people. If there was any accuracy in horror movies, they would probably strike when her paranoia began to calm down. She hoped the attack wouldn't come in the form of a gunshot. But then again, the man seemed to enjoy the classic look of vampires. It would come as a quick grab, perhaps, possibly ending in a bite. She frowned at the thought. The concept of bites had always been a little repulsive to her, and she didn't particularly like the needle-shots that would be required to administer the preventative..
 
Since Eleanor seemed confident, Xyne didn't think that there would really be much of a problem. True, he didn't know what her special talent was, but at the same time, she didn't know his. Not that one of his was terribly useful in a fight, but the other, that had saved his life more than once. The fact that Adrian regularly insisted on sparring, read throwing Xyne around, only helped him.

While Eleanor seemed overly alert, eyes darting around, Xyne knew that whatever happened there would be little to no warning. The main problem with a vampire was that they could move both quickly and silently. They used those skills well.

When the attack did come, it came from two different directions. One from an alley aimed at Eleanor, and one from above, aimed at Xyne. The one that aimed for Eleanor, wasn't dressed the same as the one from the Market, he was in an overly fancy suit, with perfectly styled hair. That one was obviously the stupid one of the two, because he didn't try and bite her, no, he boldly grabbed her ass when he knocked her to the ground.

Xyne's attacker, who was the same vampire from the market, landed lightly next to Xyne, and promptly bit him on the shoulder, before immediately pulling back and spitting. Xyne, who was not extremely irritated, because of course the rogue bit him in the bad shoulder, immediately pulled out his taser and fired.
 
Her first thought was, "Oh thank god they're not using guns."

That was the only thought she needed, because as soon as she hit the ground, the needle-like wires buried themselves in her skin, and a good amount of electrical power surged over her and right through the offending vampire. Cocky little shit.

She would have preferred to turn the power off almost immediately. A jolt to disable him, and a better aimed one to keep him down, but she was against the ground, and electricity had the habit of tightening muscles on normal bodies. She remembered the first time she saw her father get shocked. He had touched that he thought was a deactivated wire. It had been a weak current, but he had seemed to refuse to let go, no matter how much she screamed at him. When she had cut the power, he had explained it: the things electricity could do to muscles.

She was feeling it, very uncomfortably, right now.

It took a good amount of strength to get him off. She was glad for the training. Getting herself off the ground was a matter very similar to a push up, and removing the wires that were setting the electricity coursing over her? Well, that was about three seconds in a partial one-handed push-up. With the dead weight of a man on top of her. A man that was clinging to her extremely tightly.

As a teenager, it would have been impossible. As an adult that had been drilled for nearly a year, it was doable, but not easy.

He landed beside her with a dead thump and proceeded to twitch unconsciously while Eleanor shakily picked herself up off the ground. She was glad it was vampires. Anything else could have very well been killed by that.
 
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