Incubus Dreams - October 27th

[anita_blake]

As Anita wakes up, she makes several realizations.

She is on the floor.

She is on the floor of her kitchen.

She is on the floor of her kitchen, naked.

Slowly, she looks around and sees Nathaniel on the floor at her side, his cheek resting on her thigh. Memory comes back to her, of the hungers, of the ardeur, of the fucking and feeding and memories. Anita eyes dart around, looking for Damian, because Damian was with them, and they land on his form, bathed in sunlight.

Like his pale skin had been dipped in honey, and Anita has the distant thought of how beautiful the vampire looked with his blood-red hair, warm skin, and relaxed features. But the most overwhelming thought was that Damian was bathed in sunlight! She scrambles over to him, grabbing Damian by the ankles, and pulls him out of the sunlight, but then he's awake, screaming, struggling, and Anita panics.

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[nathaniel_kitten]

Nathaniel is up in a blur of motion, as quick as the predator he is, strength and speed enhanced by those marks. All the marks that burn between everyone, burn inside him, and he curses Asher for not giving him that third mark. If Asher had, maybe...

God, maybe what?

He's down the hall, sees Damian go up the stairs, and he curses, practically flying up the stairs himself. Nathaniel hears Damian screaming in the guest room and he's instantly in there. With a snarl, he pounces Damian, arms around the vampire's neck.

"For fuck's sake, Damian, down, not up! Christ!"

[mr-smarty-vamp.livejournal.com]

It's all instinct, and centuries of warrior training doesn't let him down when he feels the threat pounce him. He has to get out of the sunlight, and whatever has him is trying to stop him.

He grabs one of the arms around his neck, digging his nails into it as he runs into one of the walls. He isn't sure how much force he uses, but it works, and the restraining arms drop away. He's gone from the room in another instant, across the hall into the bathroom, but the sunlight streams in there, too.

Inhuman speed means you fall hard when you trip, and he ignores the pain of it as he crawls diagonally across the hallway again.

Another bedroom. Another bright window. Another scream.

[anita_blake]

"Was that Damian?" says a voice over her shoulder as Anita heads up the stairs after them. She looks quickly behind her to see Gregory following, and just nods.

"Close all the drapes up here, Gregory. Start at the far end of the hall."

Anita meanwhile heads into the room Damian had just entered. It was easy to tell which room that was because of the inhuman screams coming through the open door.

[nathaniel_kitten]

Nathaniel limps out of the bedroom Damian had slammed him into a wall in, and he can already feel his body healing the broken bone and torn muscle.

This, he decides, is just fucking insane. They were never going to get Damian under control. But, Nathaniel grits his teeth and heads down the hall, determined to help where he can.

[mr-smarty-vamp.livejournal.com]

Anita might be heading into the room, but Damian is most definitely heading out of the room, and he collides with her, slamming her into the wall on his way out. It isn't with intentional force, so he probably doesn't harm her badly.

Her touch doesn't calm him, though, and he has no calm to give in return. There is something pulling at his arm, and he twists, trying to run from it and only succeeding in slamming Anita into the other wall of the hallway.

[anita_blake]

Anita stubbornly refuses to let go of Damian's arm, and when he shifts to throw her into the wall again, she sets her feet, twists his momentum, and sends him crashing into it instead, hard enough to break the plaster.

It's not Damian that turns, snarling at her. Everything human and rational in him boils away as he drives Anita to the floor. Without the marks from Jean-Claude giving her that little extra burst of speed and resistance, he'd have torn her throat out. Fortunately, she has enough time to get a hand around his throat and one against his chest. His teeth snap at her as he bears down on her arm, slowly buckling it with the sheer brute force of his body weight.

[mr-smarty-vamp.livejournal.com]

A rational being would use arms and legs to overpower, but Damian isn't rational. He's lost to the madness now. Pressing down only with his weight, he snarls and spits, his fangs bared as he mindlessly struggles to sink his teeth into the threat he has pinned on the floor.

[anita_blake]

Anita's arms start to shake from the effort of holding him back, and Damian's teeth continue to press closer to her throat. She screams for help, and suddenly sees Gregory above her, pulling on Damian's arms. It's enough to slow, but not stop, the descent.

If Damian were just a rouge vampire, Anita could probably have killed him, even unarmed as she was. Damian not being a master vampire, it was possible that the metaphysical boosts she's built up would have been strong enough to tear his throat out with her bare hands. Simply stopping him, though, was a much harder proposition.

[nathaniel_kitten]

Ignoring the pain shooting through his shoulder, Nathaniel grabs Damian, helping Gregory, pulling the feral vampire back from Anita. Blood is still dripping down his arm, though, the arm currently yanking on Damian.

But he doesn't think about that.

He just needs to get Damian away from Anita before the vampire does something Jean-Claude will have to actually punish.

[mr-smarty-vamp.livejournal.com]

That thought would normally have given Damian pause. Jean-Claude doesn't punish unless it's earned, but the punishment is harsh. If he'd been sane before, he would never have done the things that sent him to the cross-lined coffin for six months. If he were sane now, he wouldn't be doing any of this.

But alas...

Sane or not, all vampires react to fresh blood, and Nathaniel's is all to close. He turns his head toward Nathaniel's arm with a snarl, but Gregory is quick to anticipate. The other wereleopard is a fraction too slow, though, and his arm only manages to get halfway around Damian's neck.

The wrist is right in front of Damian's mouth, and he bites hard. When the wrist tries to pull away, he follows it, leaving Nathaniel and Anita behind so he can pin Gregory and gnaw on his arm, feeding on the blood and flesh like a wild animal instead of a vampire. He doesn't hear the screams. He doesn't care about them. He just wants the blood and takes what he wants.

[anita_blake]

Nathaniel beats her to where Damian and Gregory had landed farther down the hallway. He manages to get arms around Damian's waist and pull him back, but it's not enough to dislodge the fangs from Gregory's arm, broken now by the impact with the floor.

Suddenly, Damian shoots straight up into the air, slamming them both into the ceiling. When they hit the ground again, Damian is able to shake them off easily and turn his attention back to Anita.

She's managed to get to her feet by now, and when Damian barrels toward her, all of her judo training takes over. She catches his arm, pivots across her hip, and tosses him like a rag doll all the way back to the top of the stairs. Strength is good. Leverage is better.

[puppyeyedulfric.livejournal.com]

With everything that happened last night, Richard headed to Anita's as soon as he was up for it. He'd heard the commotion almost as soon as he'd hit the front porch. So he let himself in and hit the stairs to see what was going on.

There's a blink as he registers that Damian had landed in front of him. The thought running through his head is that Damian shouldn't even be awake at the moment.

[mr-smarty-vamp.livejournal.com]

And that moment of thoughtful hesitation will cost the werewolf dearly. He barrels into the Ulfric, unbalanced from Anita's throw, and they both topple down the stairs.

Damian isn't at all rational, so all he does is react to the presence of a powerful were in his way. He recovers his footing, crouches, and attacks. The threat backs off, but he follows it. The walls expand out into the living room, and he charges again.

[puppyeyedulfric.livejournal.com]

The living room gives Richard the room to move, to use his arms and legs and to brace himself a little more. The pause that Damian takes gives Richard time to set up for a roundhouse kick to catch Damian's face.

[mr-smarty-vamp.livejournal.com]

And catch it he does. One kick to one side of Damian's head, and then a second kick to the other side.

Pain explodes at Damian's face, and blood flies from him in a thin arc. The kicks are so well placed and carried out that he staggers backward into the wall.

There is a gash on the side of his face, along with cuts from where his own teeth have slashed through his lip. The kicks must have hit hard because he doesn't recover immediately, but stays leaning against the wall for several seconds.

[anita_blake]

Anita makes it down the stairs just in time to see the kick and Damian still manage to make it to the wall without falling. Damian may not be master level, but that didn't mean he was weak.

Richard sets up for another kick, and Anita catches herself staring at him, impressed with the easy stance that belies the strength behind it. Unlike Nathaniel and Gregory, here was someone with preternatural strength and the fighting skills to use it effectively.

She snaps her head back to Damian, inwardly cursing herself for having lost focus in the middle of a crisis, but the vampire still hasn't moved away from the wall. As a matter of fact, he's been standing there for a good thirty seconds or so, so maybe Richard's kick did some good and knocked a little sense back into the vampire.

[puppyeyedulfric.livejournal.com]

Richard's hands are held up in a loose defense stance, watching Damian warily. He knows, somewhere in the back of his mind, that he can't actually put the vampire down. So, he was really hoping that he'd knocked some sense into Damian, but because he wasn't sure he didn't drop the defense. Nor did he let the thought stop him from shifting into a stance so he was ready if Damian came at him again.

[mr-smarty-vamp.livejournal.com]

Unfortunately for Anita and Richard, Damian proves them wrong in a blur of white and red as he charges Richard again.

The lights are on, but nobody's truly home. There is no reason in Damian's blazing, emerald eyes. All there is is the instinct to attack back at something that hurts him.

[puppyeyedulfric.livejournal.com]

Richard reacts, almost all instinct, with a kick to Damian's chest. Aiming there means he won't miss with Damian coming right at him. The power behind the kick would have dropped a human, almost all his strength behind it.

[mr-smarty-vamp.livejournal.com]

Ah, but Damian is a vampire and manages only to stumble back again at an angle that puts him within arm's reach of Anita.

For a few moments, he goes perfectly still, like a white statue spattered with blood from a battle fought in a garden or ancient city square. Sensing the powerful energy behind him, he turns in a flash and flings himself at Anita despite the pain that burns through him with every movement.

[anita_blake]

Anita throws herself to the side, rolling over the couch. Damian's quick enough to alter his course, though, and barrels into her as soon as she manages to get to her feet.

Trying to stop the fall would have only resulted in having something of hers broken. The force behind Damian's advance is just too great. Instead, she goes with the fall, grabbing Damian's arms and bringing one foot up into his chest. It's a desperation move, this particular throw, but Damian had left her no choice. Anita drops back and shoves with all her might, sending Damian flying over her head and into the far wall hard enough to leave an indent.

[mr-smarty-vamp.livejournal.com]

It's one of those blows that you simply don't get up from immediately. The impact with the wall jars Damian enough that he doesn't stand, but slides down the wall to the floor in a heap.

The instinct is to rise and attack again -- and instinct is all that rules Damian at the moment -- but it takes time, and that gives the others in the room time to react and anticipate.

[anita_blake]

Anita rolls to her feet and takes the moment's pause to assess the situation. She'd thrown Damian clear of everyone else in the room, but unfortunately, that put him closest to the open front door. She hopes that the vampire's instinct to avoid the sun would negate that as an escape option, but hope and $3.95 will buy you a latte.

She starts edging her way around the room toward the door, ready to cut off that avenue of motion should Damian manage to overcome that instinct. She doesn't know why Damian isn't burning in the sun, let alone awake this early in the day, but she does know that the last thing they needed was a revenant vampire marauding in the middle of the day. That would lead to an order of execution being issued, and then Anita would have to kill Damian. That's simply unacceptable to her.

She's almost at the door, reaching out to slam it when the hair on the back of her neck stands up and she realizes that Damian is looking right at her.

[mr-smarty-vamp.livejournal.com]

There is that moment of stillness from Damian once again, the calm before the storm.

From his crouched position next to the wall, he charges once again. The terror that the sunlight inspires in him only adds to the madness, oddly negating the need to get out of the bright rays and into some dark, safe haven.

[puppyeyedulfric.livejournal.com]

Richard was moving almost as soon as Damian moved, but he wasn't close enough to get between Damian and Anita. Instead he chose to crash into the vampire, taking them both down to the floor trying to pin him.