maskeddarkness | Trial of Trials : Act 2

Trial of Trials : Act 2

There's something uneasy that can be felt in the city, and seemingly no end to the rumors springing up in the wake of the downtown explosion that leveled BOARD's headquarters. Stories of an odd sickness where the afflicted suddenly winds up anemic, their blood levels dangerously low, despite feeling fine that morning have already taken root, others of strange animals seen roaming at night, and horrible screams and gunshots in one of the parking garages....

The space where the ill-fated headquarters lays silent, an empty patch of dirt and gravel that seemed to attract those drawn to stories and rumors. Police have already had to shoo away opportunists with metal detectors, hoping to find something interesting in the impressively quickly cleared wreckage, and others have reported something that just feels... wrong, when they walk by the site. The ghosts of those who hadn't made it out of the collapse? Or something else? Noone can really put a finger on it to explain.

And meanwhile, under the cover of shadows, things unknown to those who still walk in the light continue to move. Whispers of the rogue mage and a treasure trove of information, of upsets in the vampire hierarchy, and sworn revenge on the mages who had used one of their own for their gain.

And deep in a hidden lab, BOARD's remains and allies continue to work, twisting all they can get their hands on to create the perfect weapon; made of the very things they wish to cleanse from the world. The loss of the incapacitated vampire elder was only a small one, with how much they had already extracted and drawn from it. And if the rumors of their knowledge being in the hands of their enemies were true? They would just have to speed up their projected timeline. Or simply slow down that of the world. After all, they were mages. Reality bended to their will, not that of those who opposed them....

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It's a fair while after Kinji's first encounter with the bastard monster wearing Tachibana's face now, and despite how much that meeting threw Kinji off-balance, he can't focus on it too much after he's done meeting up with Tachibana himself about it - it was almost sundown, which meant even if it could resist the sun, now it would be even more powerful. His plans to stalk the guy would have to wait until morning.

In the meantime, he's just going to do what he normally does: patrol the lot his storage unit was located in. After Tachibana's debacle, he was keen to not let anyone near his small, highly toxic assortment of supplies. So he wanders the aisles between the units, human-shaped, with an almost relaxed swing to his step that entirely belies how hard he's pushing all his senses to detect even the most inconspicuous presence.

There is an... odd smell nearby, that, if Kinji chooses to follow and examine, appears to be coming from a plug-in car air freshener that's laying on the ground, a crack in the cheap plastic oozing the inner fragrance gel all over the pavement.

The gel glistens unpleasantly when he points his torch at it, and his nose wrinkles. It's not necessarily a bad smell, it's just... ozoney and weird. And entirely unexpected; he's absolutely positive it wasn't there a few hours ago.

...actually, how old was it? If the gel was still leaking...

He turns and whips the torch around, trying to see if anyone's still nearby. He can't smell anyone, not this close to the gel. "Alright, who's out there?"

As if in reply, there's a small, quiet crunch of something not too far away hitting the pavement, and a second odd smell starts to leach into the air.

The torch light flicks towards it a split second after his eyes do, and he's striding towards it immediately. "Whatever y'all're playin' at, y'need t'leave. This is private property."

His voice is calm, bordering bored, but his mind is racing. Who the hell was just dropping dumb car deodorisers around the place? All they did was smell like hell and block his nose. They were practically just stink bombs, for all intents and purposes...

(A thought that probably occurs about half a second too late.)

There's a fast motion, followed by a loud crash of glass as a formerly sealed canning jar hits the pavement behind him, releasing a much stronger stink. This one carries with it more than just cheap chemical deodorizer however. A cocktail of pheromones has been mixed into what smells like the aftermath of an earthquake at a perfume counter.

And if that wasn't bad enough, moments later there's an echoing crash, another jar smashing a few feet away.

He spins around at the crash, and that just moves him straight into the explosion of stink that hits his sense of smell hard, a noxious brew that makes Kinji gasp in shock as he reels back; what the hell even was that?! It's making him gag, hard, and he stumbles in surprise, free hand rising to try and block his nose--

The second jar makes him jolt, and the odour is suddenly two-fold - he drops the torch without even realising, eyes squeezed shut from the overwhelming headache this chaos of clashing odours is giving him, so he can cover his mouth and nose with both hands - but the damage is already well and truly done. He staggers forward, blindly, just trying to get out of the epicentre of that mess so he can breathe for one second--!

Adding to the mess comes the uncomfortable feeling of reality being manipulated around him, the Mage with Tachibana's face appearing in front of him, a small, very smug smile on his face.

"Going somewhere?"

That gross distortion of space in front of him makes him stop short, and he manages to crack an eye open - that quickly becomes both widening in shock. Tach-- no, no that damn vampire, no wonder there were so many damn stink bombs, he can't even smell that now--!!

There's too much happening for his human mind to handle; sensory overload bringing on a blinding headache, the shock of those and the vampire's sudden appearance, and he's barely got enough processing power left to respond.

So, the werewolf does; a throaty, vicious growl escapes as their body starts backing up again, still staring in wild panic at the bastard.

"So easy to reduce you to such a base, primal state," the man observed idly, that smug-self pleased smile still on his lips. "The balance between man and beast... it's not much of a balance at all, is it?" he continued, taking a step forward. "For all his talk, you're just the same as the others, aren't you?"

The wolf growls again, louder this time, but it's refusing to break eye contact even as Kinji's shoes scuff through broken glass and that foul stench; so when he has to breathe it's another mouthful of that foul concoction, making his head throb with the intensity, and when he coughs it's almost a bark. He's already lost, he can't think, can't focus, he needs to get out of here...!

"What was it he called you...? Names of lesser beings are so hard to remember," the man half shrugged with a chuckle, taking another step forward, eyes glittering as he lowered his sunglasses to properly meet the werewolf's eyes.

One of the hands over his nose shifts, clutching at his temple instead, all but ripping hair out as he tries to muster the energy to react and think clearly...

"Kinji." The next growl almost sounds like an actual word, even if it's clear that it's an uphill battle. "M'name's... Kinji..."

His eye contact never wavers, meeting the vampire's readily, like he could possibly stare him down from this position. The wolf won't let him look away.

"You still can speak, even like this? Remarkable," the man smiled, taking another step closer. "Well, then, Kinji..." There's an almost echoing tone to the man's voice as his eyes flash. "Let's play a game, shall we? If you can find me and manage to touch me enough to leave a mark, without causing harm to any human lives... I'll acknowledge your right to live."

There was a nasty glimmer in the man's smile as he took a step back, letting his shades fall back down. "You have until sunrise."

Every breath is another throb of his headache, a rail spike stabbing into his self control, and both hands cling to his head as he doubles over almost completely and a hot, violent shudder runs the length of his spine, making him gasp in pain. It would be so, so easy to just let the wolf out now and finish this, tear that damn vampire limb from limb and just end it - but he can't, he won't, he's better than that.

"...m'not...playin'," he snarls, but the words are a lot harder to discern now through his growling.

"Then you choose to forfeit your life," the man returned, tone all too pleasant. "Of course, how you are now... you almost have anyway, haven't you?"

His eyes squeeze shut as he jerks again, but he manages to straighten, through sheer force of will - just enough to glare up at the vampire with cold fury in his glowing, golden eyes.

"Th...th'lot," he manages, swallowing down another bark. "Y'can't...leave..." Otherwise, Kinji would never find him. Not like this.

Edited 2017-09-08 23:45 (UTC)

The man chuckled. "Not much of a playing field, now is it? No, more than just your pen. But to give you a chance... we'll say a ten block radius. Even a beast can count that high."

No, no no no that was too big, too much for him when he could barely see straight, could barely keep the wolf from trying to escape. Especially when it tries to rear again at that beast comment, throwing Kinji to his knees with the force of effort it takes to hold it back.

"...'s'not..." Not possible, not fair, not something he can do like this, he's going to hurt someone. "...please..."

The man raised and eyebrow, looking over his shades in something bordering amusement. "Reduced to pleading? You really are helpless, aren't you?" he chuckled.

He's aware of what he looks like, on some level: reduced to his knees, trembling violently and utterly overwhelmed, each breath a heavy gasp that just send more of that debilitating stench into his system, gripping at his head like it'll do anything to hold the wolf back.

Then the monster talks again, and suddenly, that fragile thread is snapped. The scales have tilted too far. And Kinji's mind is pushed down, hard, as the wolf swells with fury, dropping their body's hands and lifting his head to give Hayami a look of pure, utter loathing, an animalistic rage beyond what this mere human form could handle, and instantly the change hits him. His voice cracks as he screams, his clothing splits and falls off his shifting form as he warps, changes and grows, far too hard and far too fast as the scream turns to a howl, turns to a wild snarl as the wolf doesn't even wait until it's finished changing before it lunges at the vampire.

Hayami watches, expression a mask of curious fascination before there's a sensation of the world wrentching around them and he vanishes, appearing behind the wolf, expression unchanged.

The wolf stumbles short when its target vanishes, but it doesn't stop moving; it feels the world shifting behind it, and turns sharply as it finishes growing; thick, oily fur, the same colour as Kinji's hair, hangs in shaggy waves, and in the light of the fallen torch its claws and teeth glint like metal, as it wrinkles its mouth in an open snarl - and it's moving again, faster than anything that big had any right to move, bringing its hand around to slash at Hayami with another violent growl.

Again, reality warps around them, Hayami appearing a few meters away this time, smirking.

It might not be the greatest thinker right now, with Kinji out of commission, but the wolf is more than aware that it's being toyed with. That doesn't stop it from trying to attack; on the contrary, each miss and every damned smile on the vampire's face just stokes its anger to greater heights, and it keeps trying to land hits, leaping over the fence of the lot in a single bound when Hayami teleports(?) outside it, and the wolf runs at top speed after him.

It's not hard to track the werewolf's path, if one were willing; it's snarling like a demon, roaring with every swipe, sending garbage cans flying and marking deep scores in dumpsters and walls as it fails, again and again and again, to land a hit.

Until the vampire is just-- gone, without a trace, with the wolf still raging and unable to smell a damned thing, and all it can do to let that fury out is to howl, a throat-ripping snarl that echoes through the alleyways surrounding it. It's not in the public eye, not yet, but it's about to be at any moment - someone's gonna go hunting.

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