I'm going back to New York city., I do believe I've had enough.

[MurderInTheRueMorgue]

I'm going back to New York city.
I do believe I've had enough.

[ooc]

It was raining in Ciudad Juarez.

The vampire was impatient, sitting in a car that would take him to the final stop before he would cross the border. A chapel in the urban sprawl of the city, the place where his hired escort would re-group for the final leg to America.

Arthur drummed his long nails against the black leather interior of an old Mercedes, sitting beside a woman in black, she was smoking a cigarette in a black laquered holder that was about the size of his thumb nail but slimmer. The only other person in the car was the driver, a skinny man in a black suit, he was wearing sunglasses and carried a little snub nosed revolver in an ankle holster.

The woman smelled like cigarettes and flowery perfume, Arthur watched her gaze out the window at rows of shops and people trying to keep out of the rain, if his heart was still beating then it would have been hammering away in anticipation because he was only a stone's throw away from his home country and that much closer to New York, the place he called home.

Arthur's bald head was covered by a bowler hat and he was wearing a black suit, a vest with silver buttons and a bow tie. He had a pocket watch, it's chain fastened through the middle button hole in his vest, it was older than him and he kept it as a memento of a time that he had seen come and go.

Sometimes he longed for it, a time when things were simpler, easier. A time when he wasn't an immortal beast plagued by a world he never asked to be a part of, but he was a part of it and that was why he was going home. Because he was tired, tired of fighting and tired of watching everybody around him die. The sole survivor of his coven, they were slaughtered in a bitter struggle for territory in Belize, the place they had tried to make their own.

"It's lonely out tonight don't you think?" He asked in a slightly amused tone, watching the woman seated beside him as she gazed at the rain soaked desolation outside.

The car turned down a narrow street that was lined down either side with old street lights, then another car followed, another black Mercedes that was following them. That car was full of people, the people who were going to escort Arthur across the border and into the United States.

They were taking him that one step closer to home.

[Shyft]

The news had come down the grapevine. A new vampire coming into New York. The Inquisition had barely missed him when he left all those years ago. Now after some little inter-coven dust up down in Central America, Arthur was heading back to New York. Apparently the heat hadn't agreed with him.

Ignatius was currently finishing his preparations; he had all the classics: combat shotgun loaded with UV rounds, teargas grenades that spewed a mixture of garlic essence and holy water, his "blessed blade" a short sword quenched in holy water and prayed over by ministers from three separate denominations, a couple of stakes in boot holsters, and of course his own powerful Charismata.
Charismata, Gifts of the Spirit, Holy Graces, no matter what you called them they more than any equipment made him what he was, a Paladin of the Order of the Sun.

Dr. Creel, as his students called him at the seminary, was truly a learned man; he had a PhD as well as a D.Min, but his true Vocation, his true Calling was as a slayer, a Knight of the Sun. The church had named the secretive order after the old Sun god, so that its existence could be more easily denied if necessary, but its members served no pagan god.

Creel finished checking his preparations before leaving the hidden room beneath his office. On this mission he was to be joined by two neophytes, former law enforcement officers who had stumbled onto the truth and were now being trained by the Inquisition. If they survived their first few encounters with the Nosferatu they would be inducted into the order and blessed with Charismata of their own. Very few managed to survive to join the ranks of the Paladins.

[Wintermute]

"It's lonely out tonight, don't you think?"


She ignored him.


The chapel was all dark, rain slick pavment shimmering in the dark and another black Mercedes hauled up behind Yumi's car. She dug a black gloved hand into a black coat, wore black stiletto heels and sheer black stockings, all black and she dug out a crumpled pack of Marlboros. Lit one with a polished brass zippo, her driver rushed to her side and unfurled a big, black umbrella.


Something didn't feel quite right, found a cold sort of comfort in the weight slung under her left arm, Stechkin APS, old soviet metal. It looked like a pistol and shot like a machinegun, reminded her of herself on a strange sort of way, but she didn't have the time to be thinking of things like that. She took a long drag on her smoke, felt the hot sensation cut a raw path down her throat and into her lungs.


She blew a long plume of acrid grey.


The chapel loomed over a narrow street, a tall belfry with it's roof half caved in and there was no bell in sight, old plaster fascade pock marked with age and more than a few bullet holes. Her back up, the men in the other car, stood in the rain and passed a pack of cigarettes around. They were locals, if the job turned sour it wouldn't matter if Yumi left them all to die.


Yumi didn't like it, it felt like a good night to die.


"Come, inside." Curt, sharp.


The local street muscle weren't worth shit to her, one of them sneered at her, but he fell in line with the others. The big driver was probably the reason, Yumi wasn't in the mood for it tonight, something was wrong and she didn't know what. She headed through the door first, artificially wired nervous system ready to snap into full blown combat mode, quicker than usual tonight.


She hated when a job felt this shitty.