Love Among Thieves

[Malkavia]

-

The ambiance in Château Hikari hit precisely the notes Madeleine had imagined, a refined but intimate atmosphere, where jazz piano as soft as rain and dim lights gave the space a rich yet cozy feeling. Like so much of Japan, space came at a premium: Only six tan, suede chairs lined the bar. A painting as tall as the ceiling covered the far wall—a sketchy piece, smudged with charcoal and splatters of color, evoking a ballerina seated in a moment of rest, her body worn-out by an implied regimen of practice. The patrons moved with the hushed air of practitioners in a church before the service, conversing in warm, muted tones that did not reach far from their table.

Madeleine had already ordered her first sampling from the three areas of Hikari's specialties: Wine, chocolate, and cheese. The wine was a sip of extraordinary aged Barolo, a fruity yet complex floral taste that reminded her of hibiscus as it slipped down her throat. As for the cheese—there Madeleine had selected very well indeed.

"The comté is magnificent," said Madeleine in Japanese sophisticated for its vocabulary yet — unbenownst to her — broken in its accent. "Can you tell me how long it was aged?"

Madeleine was one of only a few morning customers in what was one of Tokyo's nighttime establishments, which meant she could converse with the barkeep free of guilt. He explained that the cheese had been aged for twenty months, placing it on the youthful side, while elaborating in the assured but humble expertise of a sommelier on the characteristics this lent to the flavor profile.

Her outfit supported Madeleine's confidence: every time she saw her reflection in the glass of a Tokyo streetside building or in the side of a wine bottle, she felt a glitter of sparks inside her not unlike the way the wine made her feel.

Spoiler

It was like seeing her extraordinarily attractive sister—black hair in place of Madeleine's golden curls, yes, but otherwise the elegant chiffon dress, the sparse but telling golden trim about her belt, and the perfectly styled pigtails were all Citronelle. It would be just enough to keep this date private and off the books.

No, there could be no doubt: This was to be a perfect date. She had found a perfect partner — a slender redhead looking online for a sophisticated evening — and then had sculpted in her calendar a perfect date. It had not been easy. It had required work—forethought! Many had been the hours she spent across from her computer, exploring all the possible Tokyo destinations, crafting a day she would remember and savor.

But it would be worth it when the sun was setting, and she stood in front of the Sumida River, hand in hand with this Serona she'd found, full of the romance and excitement and tenderness of a perfect date. For now, Madeleine smiled and nodded, mentally taking careful note of a story about cheese and wine she'd repeat to her date in a very few minutes.

[Monsy]

One of the things she didn’t fancy about the rich was how easily they moved place-to-place. If not by a chariot, then by the modern comforts of first glass, with gifts, rewards and incentive while she folded herself on an uncomfortable seat to sleep the way over from Tokyo to Matsumoto, Nagano Prefecture. It wasn’t a place she was familiar with. The chilling draft from the station onto the cold concrete of the platform was far different than the intercoms of Shibuya. The weather, gleaming but windy, was a wake-up call to all her sleeping goosebumps. At least there was no one strangers rubbing their sweaty skin or dandruff-laden clothing against you to slither by. No huge crowds waited at the station, but bundles of stragglers numbered up to a dozen in forty feet of platform.

She rubbed her eyes, getting the crust from the inner-corner, then picked up her luggage three cars down, a red suitcase measured at hip-height, about twenty pounds with a pet carrier on-top, resting against the extended handle. “Thistle, my man.” Angelina said, crouching down, “Ready to meet my wife?” Her finger went between the cage squares, touching the top of the white rabbit’s fluffy head, who closed its eyes in the likely weariness of the sedative. “Yes ya-are. Yes you are.”

The first problem was getting a place to stay. She thought of her options on a walk from the train station, picking a path and venturing towards the urban density. A hotel was easy, although she wasn’t looking to have a deposit or credit check in her name or any other recognizable feature. She also thought about renting a property, but no way she’d get accommodation looking like redheaded Avril Lavigne in modern Japan. The same story of when she got here. Old souls.

Her first order of business was to get into a cab, then pay whatever sum the man wanted to drive, drive and drive. She talked to him endlessly with questions, practicing Japanese and trying to get a full scoop of what’s around, then asking about Château Hikari, which really meant Hikariya-Nishi. The place she knew Madeleine was going through texts she captured on an app, comfortably hidden from the Home Screen and feeding back her activity.

“You have a date there or something?” The Taxi Driver asked. Angelina felt her shins squeeze and her lower lip go dry. “Hope so.” Her breath let out, uneased. “Say, mistah. If you have a gal that leads ya on for a while, plays it sweet, then drops contact next week and gives nothin’ to ya. What would ya do?” They were back in English, as earlier, the driver wanted to practice and made a somewhat cute, reserved and accent-heavy attempt at speaking in slow deliberate syllables that grew in confidence. “I’d…Hm.” The driver stroked his chin, stopped at a light. “I’d respect her choice. Then move on. If in future, she likes me, OK. If not, then that’s it. You can’t control people, right?”

Angelina snorted. “You’re a real losah.”
“Losah?”
“It means… A good friend. A good losah, yo.”
“Ahhh. Good loser, good friend. Yes.” The Taxi Driver nodded.

She set up with an AirBnB using a credit card she swiped from a businessman one car over from where she was, having casually travelled between cars and taking a seat beside him, where she described herself as his companion. By the time he woke up, she was already gone with the card, then paid for an apartment while being taxied. When she checked in, the place was basic, small, with only a few rooms. One bed, one bath, a small compact kitchen along the wall just to the right of the entrance. Across from it, an island with a granite top that ended at a pillar wit cheap paintings she took down, tearing them up, then harvesting the nails.

That evening, she ordered a small quantity of tools from the department store. Primarily, five bulletin boards with coloured sticky notes, string, pencil, pen, drafting paper and a ramen cup. She used the old nails and racks to pin the bulletin boards into the walls. The first two she compiled were for Madeleine and Serona, promptly labelled 'my sunshine' and 'that bitch'. The latter of whom she tore the eyes from their portrait through a dozen thumbtacks, with the bottom portion being burnt and jagged with leftover ash. As she assembled them, she went into her suitcase to pull the collar she owned from Madeleine.

White and golden, with her name beautifully embroidered across the neck. The bell even had a diamond on it. A real -fuckin- diamond. Instead of picking it for all its value, she wore it on her neck throughout the home, having taken a break to play a card game, enjoy tea and feed Thistle with it on. Then she assembled all the private details she accrued from almost two weeks of watching them for at least eight hours of the day, every day. When she first saw Serona, her first instinct was to pen this girl a fun lesson about human anatomy in a funny what-if scenario. What if we spent a night pulling all your muscles into spaghetti strings? Wouldn’t that be silly?

However, the more she learned about Serona, the more her face wanted to sizzle like butter on a scorching sauce pan. Her eyes, brown, but big. The hair, red, straight and long. A narrow, symmetrical face profile. The small frame, even a bit smaller than she was at the time, with close examinations showing an even better silhouette than her own, which became polluted by a pouch of egregious lard hanging on the hem of her skirt, on her shoulders and leg.

Someone is spiking my water, what the fuck…

Serona worked in the finance department of a video game company. She learned, through private text, that she was an aspiring voice actor that was undergoing paid lessons by Madeleine, whom seemingly promised a role in voicing one of their new Ai bots. On top of that, the redheaded superstar was learning to code her own games, hoping for one or either to pan out. Wow! A real plan. Anothah bonafide supah genius for our Madsy. Yes, with that in mind, testing submissions on them was inadequate.

I wanna gnaw on their stupid hot face.

RIGHT. But the plan. It needed polish. It needed details. Specifics. She needed to make phone calls, to know the weather, in what parts of town. Then if it rained there, what was the nearest place of sunshine that could entertain a woman of infinite standards? Right, to even think about that, she needed to decide what to do about the lecherous, overrated, exploitative, unfocused, unseasoned, unworthy snake that was gnawing on the sun rays of the star in Angelina’s sky.

She spent the next few days assembling it. The steps written on paper, notes, printed photos, with colour codes running through a solid central timeline. A red line indicated the central phases, what led into what. Above, there were two strings. A purple string attached around a purple tack for additional detailing. Beside it, a blue string attached to paper for contingencies for all the different steps. On the bottom side, yellow tacks and strings marked locations. Orange for materials. Black for unknown variables.

She assembled what she may have conceived to be the perfect date. The perfect plan. The perfect gift. The perfect ask.

Then on the day of, when Madeleine was at Château Hikari, Angelina took a bus to Hagashimuchi. A quieter neighbourhood mixed with small business, small offices and small apartments and duplexes. On the skyline, if you stand between an alley, you can see the top slopes of the Matsumoto castle, ascending towards the sun. She, instead, stood in that alley, leaning against a bike rack, two feet on her skateboard with fully adorned punked clothing.

A leather jacket that hung low plastered in grunge tattoos over a crop-shirt with a wide collar going off one shoulder—a frowning alien in the middle. She wore an asymmetrical black skirt that reached lower-thigh on one side then mid-thigh on the other, kept up by a thick studded belt. On her legs were nylons over fishnets, then flat-soles to ride her longboard. Her wrists had sleeves. Her neck had a studded choker.

When she got bored, she rode up and down the alley non-stop with kick-turns or switching her footing mid-cruise to push goofy the other way. Eventually, three workers of a neighbouring establishment came from the back exit, holding a ladder. She looked, then peered up and saw the roof not -too- far over their heads. The slope wasn’t an ideal ledge to grab, but it gave an entire survey of the streets on either side. “Hey! Hey! Hold it there!” Angelina called out, getting their attention with a wave. They had it pointed upward, right as she needed it. She ran towards them, jumping and climbing the rungs in rapid fashion until she sprung like a spider monkey, grabbing the gutter of the roof then swinging until her soles met the wall. Angelina was able to let herself dangle and scrunch her body till she lifted a leg over the edge and scrambled up the slope. On the apex, she waited for the first signs of red hair.

About an hour later, a bus pulled up and dropped off six passengers. Among them was the snake, dressed pretty with a coat over what was clearly a formal dress. Her hair was straighter than Angelina’s. She could see the makeup from here. And when she imagined her disgust, phantom smells of their hideous skunk perfume touched her nose until she wanted to growl, pounce and dunk them in water until it was no more.

She stood up on the roof, walked as they walked, then down and slid down the slope, hanging off the gutter by one hand and dropping into the alleyway where she started. All that was left was to walk to the bike rack where she left her board, hop-on and ride to say hello.

[Malkavia]

The previous day.

Angelina had vacated the apartment three times prior, spending roundabouts forty-five minutes on average per excursion. On this, the fourth trip, Shimmerlace moved in to inspect what she could only assume was Rabbit Napper HQ.

The lock, a steel thumbturn she could have picked in five seconds or less, suggested lax security, but the would-be home invader paused in the cool mountain afternoon in Matsumoto. She could hear the rumble of far-off light traffic while the wind shook the leaves of the trees, planted one could not doubt to paint some green beside the grim, gray apartment building. Unlike her usual pink, fey get-up, your girl's outfit suggested a more earthly woman—a lady with shoulder-length black hair and long bangs, all matching wide, black sunglasses. She wore a brown overcoat that fell just below her knees, simple and minimalist, in keeping with Matsumoto's more discrete fall fashion.

Her eyes paused as they inspected the doorframe, and she leaned in, squinting as she lifted her sunglasses. Flush with the door, a thin black band of plastic inserted into the gap betrayed an electric sensor connected to...She could only guess.

A shotgun, mayhaps, primed to blow the unsuspecting intruder's head open like a pulpy melon? Shimmerlace caught herself stepping away unconsciously. Naaah, c'mon shimbo, thought she, breathing with intentional slowness as sweat beaded on her forehead. Let's not entertain insane ideas, now.

Still, God only knows what it was connected to. She'd already scanned the joint for windows, of which naturally there was exactly fucking zilch. She huffed and bit her lip. Fuck but she did not care for plan B.

—

"So you think she'd like the castle then? Huh." Shimmerlace spoke in French to a Japanese man dressed in khaki pants and a corduroy jacket, a gentleman roughly as tall as the lower edge of her tits, who waddled beside her, bald and wearing a pair of round spectacles that refracted light like the bottom end of a shot glass. "Mayhaps, mayhaps! But you know—chances are she's already been, yeah? I gotta bring her somewhere memorable for her birthday, you dig? Somewhere she won't never forget."

The old landlord nodded vigorously and launched with remarkable Parisian French into a rapturous discourse on the many intimate and beautiful nooks and crannies Matsumoto could offer Angelina on her special day. As Shimmerlace had learned yesterday, he apparently had spent thirty years operating a barge on the French canals for tourists before retiring into real estate rented to his pals abroad. She found it hard to imagine this tiny man at the head of even a modest vessel, and the image was almost enough to make her grin despite the devils tearing their claws into the insides of her chest.

As they reached the door to the AirBnB, however, the old man's chatter slipped out of focus, and Shimmerlace found herself imagining key sliding into the lock, the door swinging open—the shotgun crack! The poor old man's head splattered across the sidewalk. She felt sick, and when old Mr. Shimada pulled his ring of keys off his belt — still blabbering away about some kind of carriage ride tour of the city — she had an instinct like a lightning clap to grab his shoulder, to pull him back, shaking her head, I'm so sorry, but I've lied to you sir, we should call t he police.

Instead, she quietly stepped to the side of the doorframe.

The door swung open.

Click!

A flash of light lit up the old man's face, and Shimmerlace's face twisted into a ghastly grimace of terror.

"...There's a camera..." The old man stared, frowning in puzzlement. "Ah, I see. Yes, she installed...a camera. Goodness. I hope she didn't drill anything..." He began to step inside, a serious look clouding his face just as his cellphone buzzed. "Eh?"

Shimmerlace peered around the doorframe. Sure enough—Angelina had installed a camera, a simple handheld thing, to hang over the doorframe, connected by a wire to the sensor glued to the door an doorframe.

"Well...I! Get out, she tells me! From my own property, while she's...installing goodnes only knows what this—what what—"

Shimmerlace breathed very deeply and smiled, taking the old man's hands in her own as she glanced at the text from dear Angie...GET OUT indeed...and unsettled message our man was in the midst of composing. He made an angry grunt, rounding on Shimmerlace and her quite forward manners. She bowed a hundred and twenty degrees until her nose almost touched the ground.

"Shimada-san, I apologize, deeply, for any damages my friend may have incurred. She's—a wee bit thoughtless at times, hah. A rough type, not very polite, as we tourists tend to be. I will of course pay whatever you deem fit in her stead."

She raised her head, meeting Shimada's eyes where she found — praise be to pirate Jesus — a look of uncertainty. She smiled, sheepish but wide in a way she knew would glitter in her eyes. "But please, let's keep this simple. It's for her birthday, and I'd feel just awful if the surprise or mood of it all got ruined, after all the work I've put into it."

His forehead creased, and he snorted. "Bah! Fine, fine!" He pulled the phone away, then took of his glasses and ran his hand over his face, still glancing up at the camera and then back at Shimmerlace, as if struggling to accept its reality. "Just. Tell your little friend not to burn the place down, I suppose."

"Thank you, Shimada-san." And as your girl rose from her bow and looked down at the agitated little man, she felt a rush of genuine gratitude for him and all the gods of this place and that he had not been blown to bits on the stoop of his own apartment. She took his shoulders and, knowing the disaster that could easily follow the immense rudeness of what she did next, squatted down and kissed his forehead, squeezing his shoulders like the handlebars on a bike she did not trust to stay upright.

They pulled apart, him brushing himself off, glaring at her and shaking his head, but his eyes told her she'd be alright. "...You're kind of a weirdo," said he, using the English weirdo in the French sentence. "Well, that's that. Have fun with your friend, Miss Adelaide. Stop by the Hibachi tonight, if you'd like. We can train that shameful Japanese of yours over some sake, aha!"

Shimmerlace grinned, ear to ear, and bowed, waiting for the old man to turn his back before slipping into what she'd soon find was precisely The Rabbit Napper's lovenest—careful to use nearby brick to prop the door slightly open

—

The inside of the apartment crackled with a kind of holy energy Shimmerlace could feel in her fingertips. God was never far, she knew, from those who made of life a performance, but she could feel Its downy wings all over this, the abode of The Marauder.

It was Hers. She'd lived her. Slept here. She even had Thistle's — fuck it all — empty carrier for Shimmerlace to touch, achingly. Seeing that damn rabbit constantly on the Marauder's shoulder, so fucking comfortable and happy—that had been the worst detail of this whole adventure. Shimmerlace ran her hand over carrier's top, grimacing, before quietly invading the rest of the Temple.

On the surface — as with so much great magic — the space seemed mundane, a mere shell of an apartment, bought on the cheap. But fuck it. Your girl was meticulousl in her search, turning out the drawers and searching inside the toilet bowel like a priest conducting a gentle, if hurried ritual. Only two rooms really drew notice, even with her paranoid eye for cameras and booby-traps: The bedroom and the door with the shiny, newly installed deadbolt.

As for the bedroom, that was a fine bit of comedy. Here was a bed strewn with ridiculously plush stuffed animals, littered with — fucking GAG me — rose petals. When she dared to plumb the drawers of the dresser beside the bed, she found all kinds of interesting gems—silver-gleaming handcuffs, bottles of scented lubricant. And under the bed? Why, crimson rope, of course, among other shameful toys.

Shimmerlace would have laughed loud enough to shake the windows if the idea of sound hadn't terrified her. Still, despite jumping at every shift in the house's weight, she grinned. So, she'd followed dear Angie all the way from Tokyo, sniffing this trail of Paparazzi sightings and online conspiracists and her own eyes from afar on the crimson hair, just to find...a hole in the wall where Ol' Angie could get down and fucking dirty.

That other door, though, which loomed in the corner and gleamed like a ghost watching the rest of this invasion—that almost did Shimmerlace in. Picking the deadbolt was a challenge that took her half a minute of gentle proding and whispering to the pins within before the bolt turned, but it was the handle that got her. As soon as her fingerpads pressed against the metal, fire erupted up her arm, and her muscles seized, and she choked as sparks flew from the point of contact.

Next thing, she was on the ground on her back, gasping, drool down her jaw and her hand throbbing. "Fuck," she gasped, unsure if she was alive. She bit her lip and suppressed a sob. Her whole body tingled. Her hand flew to her neck.

Thud-thud. Thud-thud. Heavy, panicked. Living. She sighed, lips trembling. She should've fucking known.

OK Shbimbo. OK, ye gods present. What next?

She sat, breathing heavily, and staring at the knob. She licked her lips, then drew a small cardboard box of latex gloves from her jacket and began to peel them out. One layer. Two layers. Fuck, but I was stupid to forget these in the first place. Had she left prints? Would Angelina check for prints?

Three gloves in and the adhesive pressure from the latex was making her hands tingle from the circulation. She glances at her fingers, wiggling them, then at the knob.

Fucking shit but this is dead-brain.

She stood and paced, thinking, flexing her fingers. She wandered into the kitchen, humming under her breath. Could there be a breaker in here? No, she'd already checked. In the main office? She glanced at her watch, then wished she hadn't. No time.

She remembered something she'd seen in one of the kitchen drawers—a pair of hot oven gloves—Well. Less gloves and more a kind of rubberized claw for pinching the edges of hot trays. She pulled them out and put them on. Pinch pinch. Despite her heavy breathing, she crooked a grin. Rawr. Fear me, the Shimbo-saurus.

Alright, but the clock was ticking, and the idea of Angelina entering now—she could imagine it. The horns. The look of death in those demonic eyes, the same eyes that promised to cut a night before with a long dagger that gleamed in the dark. Shimmerlace turned, back rigid, mouth slightly open, but leaning forward. Determined.

In the quick moment in which she grabbed and then turned the nob, she heard a sizzle that made her heart leap, but then she yanked and rolled into the room—not electrocuted. As she rolled onto and sprawled on the carpet, she kicked away the car battery rigged to the handle.

Once she caught her breath and looked at the gloves, she realized the heat from the metal had melted partway into the rubber, and when she inspected the handle, she realized her skin and the rubber had both left charred marked on the silver metal.

FUCK. Hard to miss that shit, wouldn' it? She pounded her fist against her head as she hurried back into the kitchen, muttering as she grabbed a sponge. Scrubbing — with soap — helped, thank God. It helpled. Shimmerlace couldn't see any smudge on the steel, once she finished.

But as Shimmerlace stood staring as if she wanted her eyes to extend out of her head to scan the knob, a small part of her thought Wouldn't we like for her to know we were here?

To know she was violated? By you?

...And won't she find out, dear Shimbo, no matter how hard ye to try to sweep up your clumsy tracks?

For example, sweet cunt mine: How are you going to replace the melted-up oven mitt?

—

The room was worth it.

If in the rest of the house, God had revealed Itself through the mundanity of adventure and the meaning of Angelina's everyday objects, here was the sanctum where lay the beautiful, deep secrets.

Here was a step-by-step plan for the entire day, complete with maps and contingencies etched out like some phantasmagorical high school diorama project. At points, the sheer density of all the connections and plans and ideas was almost overwhelming, as if Angelina herself barely knew the notes she was painting, drawing, tying onto these post-it boards.

There were a few huge planets in this constellation of notes, dense centers of gravity around which the sharpie scrawl and frayed knots of red, blue, yellow, orange, black, and purple became particularly manic and snarled. The Marauder never used a name—just Gold. My Sunshine. But then, Shimmerlace was versed in the magic of true names. Her hands clenched into fists. A part of her wanted to vomit, or to shove her boot through the board. To grab the cardboard and tear it to pieces.

"Fucking Madeleine," was all she could growl. Her God drifted into the ceiling, and she felt her blood boil. Madeleine. Well, that just made crystal perfect sense of the fucking stuffies, then, didn't it?

If before Shimmerlace had been noting Angelina's destinations throughout the next day with a kind of excited high, a motivated combatant finding a critical weakness, now she planned her interferance with deadly intent, photographing every inch of these boards while she burned Angelina's ideas into her memory with a hot iron.

—

Three minutes after Shimmerlace shuffled out of the apartment, closing it securely behind her as the final in a meticulous search for clues to her presence, she saw the Marauder from her perch in the nextdoor building, who returned, rabbit on shoulder, and let herself back into the apartment. Shimmerlace waited five minutes, then ten.

But she never got a single clue as to what, if anything, the one who had stripped her of her home with Madeleine noticed in her not-so-inviolate apartment.

—

The next day:

Shimmerlace arrived ahead of everyone—shuffling into the streets of Matsumoto before the sun was even up. She wandered through the open, cool air, enjoying the relative solitude of the city—and she even managed to find her way to the famous castle itself. Here on one end—the Japanese alps, snow-capped and majestic. And in the other corner—one of the jewels of Japanese heritage. Shimmer sat in quiet beside the lake surrounding the castle and watched the sun peak over its pointed rooftop. She bowed to the spirit of the place, then made her way back to Site #1.

And then...it was time to wait.

She killed the time by walking, since it was that or sitting on her ass in a coffee shop somewhere, all jittery and just waiting to get noticed by big red and rabbit-stealing. Sure, walking also kept her nerves high, and she must have looked nervous as fuck pacing through the place. But at least it let the nervous out. The cobblestone walkways that zigged and zagged through the city lent her walk a sense of adventure. Fog hung along the surrounding mountains like orbed spiderweb. The day was gray and cool, and it made Shimmerlace feel safe, as if the clouds themselves would hide her.

But then, as she made her trek back to X Marks the Spot—she saw her. She was in motion, commandeering some poor fuck's ladder so she could claw her way to a rooftop.

Shimmerlace became intimately aware of her heartbeat.

God on a fucking stick, but she needed to learn to climb like that. The practiced motion, Angelina's ease in three dimensions, still made her insides stir.

She grabbed a nearby bike rack to steady herself. Her knees felt numb and shook, and she wasn't sure her breath was making it all the way down to her lungs. Fucking mountain air.

She was really here.

And so, Shimerlace realized as she stared down at the rack, was her board.

Shimmerlace bent over and picked up the board. It was heavy in her hands, well-worn along its surface, with wheels not far from needing to be replaced. Was it the same one Angelina'd used to fuck with Yuki? Didn't that one get smashed?

But the sun was inching through the sky, and Angelina'd be back any second. Her first thought went to the nuts in the wheels. She grabbed one, tried to turn, slipped, and cursed. Fuck—she hadn't exactly brought her ten-wrench toolbox, had she? But she did have a pair of latex gloves stashed away — in case she needed to conceal prints — so she yanked that out of her tourist's side pocket, pressed it against the nut and —

It budged, slipping along its grove. Shimmerlace glanced up, left, right. Still empty. She moved fast, breathing hard, as she loosened one, two, three, finally all four bolts. Then she put it back and backed away.

Her heart pounded in her neck, and yet—no lightning bolts. No divine punishment. She hurried across the street into the nearby coffee shop, found a table by the window, and waited.

[Monsy]

Angelina walked the peak ledge one foot in-front of the other, eyes fixed at the floozy at ground level. Floozy-ona never even thought to peer up this way, at Angelina. If the hussy had a brain like hers, which she'll need to impress Madeleine, then she should've smelled the strawberry perfume Angelina spritzed onto a few pieces of Madeleine's clothing.

Surely different than her sunshine's citrus. Then they'd know someone else was in the picture and watch their bitch-ass. Or maybe she does know and is proceeding anyway, playing the snake. And judging by Madeleine's record in sensing the bad ones--given she needed to get her head bashed in before acknowledging the psycho in our midst--it was most definitely on her to show Madeleine just how scummy people can be.

If only she'd listen, but noooooooooooooooooooo. First wolf in sheep's skin that pretends to look up to you and she folds like finding puppies in the rain. A redheaded ugly puppy. A sick. Sick. Sick twisted freak with teeth sharper than doctor needles, no doubt.

She's done. She is. DONE-done.

When she squatted down, grabbed the ledge and swung her legs to drop, she felt her stomach suddenly curl. She thought of this girl being greeted. The introductory hug and cheek kiss from a manipulated Madeleine. The floozy-ona germs and smell when her and Madeleine inevitably reconnect. Then what will they do later? Her Madsy is a LAW girl, so it's quite obvious this wallet-leech was just looking for a jackpot and to score.

She threw down her board, thought, 'If I barf, let it be on that ugly pencil skirt!!'

Then she pushed. A longboard only needed one good push to roll at walking speed through concrete, with its large rubber wheels beating out rocks and bumps for a stable ride. She leaned back around the corner, then pushed the to double her speed. Left and right, she banked around pedestrians until--(SKKRRRRKKK)... A wheel on the front came off the bolt and the truck bit into concrete, then ground the board towards an ugly halt. "shit-." Her torso leaned too far in the jerk. The board slowed too suddenly. She went crashing towards her front, but was able to tuck the shoulder and roll on it onto her back, largely sparing her wrists and face from eating shit.

Whatever.

She sat up, nursed her shoulder, looked and tried to find the floozy again. On a board or on foot didn't matter. They were toast the moment she locked eyes on them.

[Malkavia]

As soon as the redhead in horns hopped on her longboard, another woman with sleek, short black hair hurried out of a nearby coffee shop, walking towards her at an unsettlingly quick pace—like a mother marching to extricate her kid from an embarrassing bit of trouble without appearing to be embarrassed. Her eyes were locked on the devil-girl as she pulled down the street. A bystander might even have said her look was icy, and others might have suggested the way she clenched and unclenched her hands suggested a burning nervous energy.

But the gods were with the fairy, and the streets were sleepy that morning. She got to watch while Angelina soared, then wobbled. She felt a lovely spike, something close to glee that for her to bite her lip to suppress a grin. PEW! Off went one of the front two wheels! Kerplong—there goes the second, and our Marauder in Chief ate fucking shit.

Shimada's "Miss Adelaide" dove down the street. Despite her upscale overcoat and straight-leg trousers, she wore black tennis—perfect shoes for running. "Damn, miss! ...You OK?" Her voice was American, plain and boring. Standard tourist. She was bounding down the cobble-stone street that functioned to serve both pedestrian and low levels of auto traffic. One older woman walking a Shih Tzu dog stared at the downed woman, frowning, but without interrupting her morning stroll. In moments, Shimmerlace was at Angelina's back—so close she could imagine the heat of the demon's anger radiating off her back and scorching her eyebrows.

"That was a Hell of a fall, ma'am...Need help?" She reached out a hand to grasp her shoulder...while her other hand, hot and sweat-slick, gripped the trigger of a handheld taser nestled in her pocket.

She's gonna recognize you, Shim, said a roiling something in her gut as her hand made terrifying, electric contact with the demon's shoulder.

The lilt in your voice.

the curve of your jaw.

The melted oven mitt on your fingers.

She's going to smell you and rip your guts out.

Despite the way the world suddenly felt like it was a long hallway full of molasses, Shimmerlace kept pushing stupidly forward with the plan in her mind's eye—to pull Angelina towards her, gut to back, and stab the stun gun into her spine.

[Monsy]

Sitting up, she heard a nagging voice. Someone--a losah--was trying to talk to her about something. They existed at the back of her mind. Her eyes locked on the only thing that mattered on the street: the cancer on the other side. She stood up, gave them just a small glance and subtle glare, then said, "Move it, wiggy."

Then she moved past them, continuing a march with her eyes locked on the floozy that was now within fifty feet of the restaurant--so maybe sixty to Madeleine, which was thirty-two thousand seven-hundred and forty-eight point four feet too much. She reached into her jacket pocket to pull a can of pepper spray, then went stiff as a board.

A sharp pain sizzled her spine like a knife was jabbing against her. Her entire body all at once squeezed and the muscles seized, contracted, hurt and she could liken it to a full-body muscle spasm. There was no way to go but back, suddenly unsure of the world as she stared into the sky, dazed, confused and limp.

[Malkavia]

Shimmerlace let Angelina collapse into her, gripping her shoulder in one hand while the other cupped her waist and pressed the taser into the soft ring of bare skin around her waist.

A bird alighted on a nearby powerline pole. It was as large as Shimmerlace's fist, gray along its back, white on its stomach, with black streaks running from its eyes down to its tailfeathers. Pretty as a painting, except for its eyes. It stared at Shimmerlace, who felt in those peepers an unsettling alien intelligence. It gave three calls, whistles that rose to chalkboard-screeching height, then fell, like a siren. I see you, Charlotte.

But other than this bird, the few people on the street glanced at the unfortunate accident—and then continued on their way. Soon, as Shimmerlace stood and got Angelina on her shoulder, she had a beat where it was just her on this narrow band of street. Her face felt hot, then cool. She breathed.

Tweeeeeet! Tweeeeet! Tweet! went the bird.

"Yeah yeah," Shimmerlace muttered, dragging Angelina limp-legged across the pavement towards the delivery alley between a Pachinko parlor and an unmarked next door building. A bar hung over it with some red kanji no doubt communicating for the public to keep out. As she moved, the bird kept its eye trained on her with a look all-too raptor-like for Shimmer's liking. "I'm moving her, alright?"

Tweet!

Why did the bird stare like that? It wasn't natural. She bit hard on her tongue and listened for any sound of coming traffic. All she heard was the bird screeching.

Not moving fast enough, not with that bum arm. And what would you be doing right now if the street were busy? Stupid, sweet. Stupid stupid.

And did you check for cameras, kitten? she thought the bird might ask next, its long black beak accusing. She cringed, glanced up and down the street, and saw none. No you don't see them, but did you REALLY check, Charlotte?

Her shoulder — the one Angelina was not presently draped over like a drunk date — ached as she heaved and dragged. She wondered, still staring at the goddam bird as she finally reached the alley and slipped into the shade, if she'd receive any matching deep wounds to the knife-slit Angelina had planted into her scapular muscle only a week prior. The idea made her tongue stick to the roof of her mouth. It had been a solid fifteen seconds, so she squeezed the trigger on the taser, and in spite of the bird, she felt a tinge of pleasure as Angelina seized and then once again fell limp.

"Fuck off," she told the world. It watched in judgmental silence.

The inside of the service alley was a narrow space between the two buildings. At the end was a high garage door, and a few staff entrances to both buildings dotted the concrete walls. There were no people, and the high, thick walls helped to insulate them from the buzz of traffic outside.

It's as private as it's gonna get in a place like this.

She dropped Angelina, letting her hit the wet cobblestone ground hard before she got down with her and planted a knee in her back. The taser slipped into her pocket, and out came the handcuffs. "Sorry to crash your big day and all, Angie dearest, but c'mooon. You know you had this was coming." Shimmerlace muttered as the silver jaw of her cuff clicked on Angelina's left wrist. Ah, the heavy clunk of a Clejuso Model 15—The Great White of cuffs, whose heavy THUNK with its thick jaw and thumb-sized bar might as well have been the turn of a bolt in an impenetrable safe.

Shimmerlace looked down at Angelina's pale, horned face, enjoying the open-mouth look on her, as she drooled into the cement, too...well, fuckin' tased to even meet Shimmer's eyes. As she took Angelina's remaining free wrist in her grip, Shimmerlace smiled like a wolf. "Ready to spend the day soaking in the drainage system, eh?"

[Monsy]

MAN — did her day feel long already. Musta' had a big trip, all in the span of ten seconds, because her legs, arms, chest and especially were back became a slob of spent muscle, just dangling on her bones in their decompressed, numb state. She thought about her sunshine waking her up. After all the drool, there would be tissue, just like on the Sunday afternoon when she fell asleep in Madeleine's lap after intending not to. Were you drooling in your sleep, sweet? N-Nno, I was just... (am I fucked if I say yes??) s-seein' if you'd notice it.

Maybe that's why she wasn't returning your call, genius.

Here, there was only gravel. Some taste of rock and dirt on the corner of her lips, the soreness of her bruised eye grinding against cobbles. She spent almost an hour trying to get that shit hidden. But, frankly, she didn't really feel it. Her back gained a new knee. "Hnnghh--." Squishing her flat until it started aching in her rib cage. Her breath came out strained and forced. And her hand would go up easy, be cuffed, then her second was about to meet the same fate. "Wait, ya damn psycho freak--. I..." God, can you even begin to lock on ONE reason she might be after you? Spoiled for choice, but who knows what she's referencing at any rate. Does she have the time or energy to invest in that loser bullshit? With Floozy-ona walkin' away pretty?

"--... C'mon. What have I done to you?? I know its hard for you to be civil, but can you just--chill. CHILL, YOU SOLDIER OF SATAN!!" Angelina tugged her arm, but didn't get far whatsoever. Leverage being such a bullshit concept that it is. "I didn't do anythin' back at Jouets! None of it is my fault! I'm really-really innocent!"

[Malkavia]

The previous night, Shimmerlace hadn't gotten to sleep until the clock read 1:30 in sizzling red letters. Her mind had been an expanding balloon, and to the let air out, she paced. Up the one end, fingers trailing the blond two-drawer dresser, turn at the long white heater, then brush next to the bed. Over and over. It had been an exceptionally narrow room, which made pacing hard since she had to make an about face at each end.

Still—this thought had occurred to her. Don't be a fucking mut if you catch her, mailman in your teeth without a clue what to do with her.

You know what you want.

Back in the present, Shimmerlace secured the last loop of the cuffs—sending a thrill through her almost like terror. Her face felt stretched, and her chest raced, but the flush that washed over her was full of glittering triumph.

"Y-yeah, I know," said she, clasping a fistful of Angelina's hair. She realized her hand was trembling—that Angelina would feel it trembling. She grit her teeth and leaned, shoving cheek into ground. "...I know. I attacked, you buried a knife in me. Fair's fair."

Somewhere, a police siren whined and honked. Japanese sirens were one of the things Shimmerlace found most disconcerting in the new country. They sounded like something out of an old movie, faster than the American squeal common in modern television. This one seemed to be moving away from them. "If it was justice I wanted, I'd be wringing Madeleine's traitor throat, not cuffing you." Shimmerlace, one hand now free, took out her old friend Mr. Taser and let it graze the inside of Angelina's thigh. "But I'm not in the business of giving shitheads what they deserve. I'm in the line of repatriating beloved companions in need of rescue. So hooooow 'bout you just surrender Thistlebro to me, and I can let you get back to whatever the fuck it is you're doing here. Mmmkay?"

[Monsy]

Madeleine—a traitor? That wouldn’t make sense. It just didn’t. Serona could be explained. One bad decision, a hopeless manipulation. Sunshine: exploited by her witchy fingers. Maybe she hadn’t looked deep enough. Could it be possible she has a medical degree of some kind? It would explain so much.

It gave her this sinking feeling as she was laying there, hollowed out her torso and trying to think of ways to save Madeleine from Serona’s evil and the syringes in her pockets. And as for Shimmer…

SIGH. Why doesn’t she just get ran over?

“Shimma, I don’t have time for games and I don’t know what bullshit you’re on about again— I need to save someone’s life here. They’re makin’ a big… HUGE mistake. Biggest one of their d-dumb fuckin’ life. You’ve been born, right? Surely you’d know.”