Fontainebleau

Snow gave Claire an unimpressed look, "We're here to work together, yes. Not for you. With you. Threats aren't a good start."

"Give it a minute.", Bowen interrupted. "We are looking around the hotel now.", he said in response to the lights flickering outside the hotel lobby. Chandler was completely still leaning against the hood of the car with his eyes shut and his arms crossed. Léon withdrew his pistol and checked it.

Nodding, Snow turned and made his way around to the back of the car, gesturing to Bastien, who tossed him the keys. He swung the boot open and reached in, pulling out a shotgun and a pouch of cartridges that he fastened to his belt. A second shotgun he tossed across to Bastien, then swung the boot shut. He checked the safety on his weapon before stepping back onto the pavement and shooting Chandler a glance. "Useful trick." he remarked.

"Maybe when we're through here, you can suck on my dick," Bastien answered Claire as he checked that the shotgun was loaded. Once done he rested it on his shoulder waiting for Bowen to ascertain what was in the hotel. Though he seemed inclined to coordinate with the VINDEX for the sake of Sophia, it was clear he had little mind to take lip from them.

The woman's eyes shifted from hazel to a muddy blood red at Bastian's comment. "I'm pretty sure, neither one of us would enjoy that." Claire responded, her accent thick and with a slight seductive air to it.

She turned to Snow. "It's not a threat. Just a warning. We want to ensure the safety of the child first and foremost. And I know there is bad blood between all of us. If that will be a problem, I will take care of it the one way I know how."

"Of course Sophia comes first," Snow replied, "but keep your warnings to yourself. We're not the ones causing trouble here."

"Well, anything?" Julienne demanded, ever the impatient one.

Lights flickered across the second floor. "Patience...", said Bowen. Chandler went rigid then and the temperature dropped sharply, sharply enough that their breath trailed vapor. Chandler spoke but it was not his voice. His voice was haunting and had an underlying female tone as if he spoke with two voices. "The girl is in room 204 with the vampire you seek. She has been tortured with a knife and yet she is still among the living.", he said as claw marks raked his neck and cheeks, sending rivulets of blood to drip down his skin. "They sit awake."

"We'll need to get Sophia away from him before we try and take him out." Snow said, "The rooms can't be big. If things get messy, she needs to be safe."

A large red wolf moved out onto the street and approached the group before stopping several paces away. As its fur receded, Vanessa stood up from the ground where the wolf had been a moment ago.

"I can do that," Vanessa said. "She's my daughter."

She had been tailing Bowen two days now, and even slept in the alley outside the VINDEX building to catch him leaving today, always with an ear out for leads that she picked up from him talking to other members of the VINDEX.

Several she had arrived at ahead of Bowen, only to be disappointed. Impatience and frustration had driven her to abandoning both the police and the packs insistence that she remain at home, but her efforts had all come up empty.

Bowen took off his coat and held it so that Vanessa could slip into it. He then moved to the trunk of his car, opened it, and after rooting around he pulled out a small metal cylinder with holes, a spoon, and a pin. He tossed it in the air and caught it again after it did a single flip. It was a flash bang.

He pulled out a pistol and offered it to Vanessa before he pulled his own hand gun, checked it, chambered a round, and putting it back in his holster. "Let's go then.", he said and shut the trunk.

Room 204 grew cold as the werewolves made their way into the hotel and climbed the stairs to the second floor. The bathroom light flickered and then there was a whisper so quite that Sophia would wonder if it was in her own head. "Your mommy and daddy are coming. Close your eyes now little one. Don't peek.", said the female voice in her ear.

---

As they walked up the stairs Bowen spoke. "Léon you have the door. Wait for the flash. Rush in and as long as Sophia is clear fill this fucker full of lead. Who's in first?", Bowen asked.

"I can." Snow said, "I'll draw his attention. Vanessa should come in after me to grab Sophia."

They came to the door quietly. Léon took one side and Bowen the other. He tapped Snow on the left shoulder and tugged him lightly so he stood beside him on their side of the door with everyone else behind him. He gave Snow the thumbs up and a questioning glance and did the same with each person behind him.

He then turned back to Léon who was on the other side of the door before taking up the flash bang, pulling the pin, but holding the spoon. He stuck three fingers up slightly above his head. One went down and Léon clenched his jaw as his eyes shifted to a yellow hue. The second finger went down and Léon shifted his weight and pivoted. The third finger dropped and he sent his foot at the door to push it in.

As the door caved in Bowen tossed in the flash bang, pulled his pistol, and averted his eyes. Léon pulled back around his side of the door. Crack, Boom. The room filled with light and a deafening crack.

Alek grinned as he heard the door crash open. He closed his eyes and jumped from his chair in the attempts to make it behind the counter. After the initial deafening sound, he remained silent, reaching into his coat to pull out both pistols. The floors were old and vibrated with every step. He would wait until he felt them moving into the room.

He had expected this to come eventually.

As soon as the flash went off, Snow rushed into the room with his gun raised. He immediately spotted Sophia at the far end of a counter-top to his left. He could smell the vampire behind it, closer to them, and he turned on the spot to aim the weapon straight at his hiding spot to give Vanessa cover to run through and grab Sophia.

Vanessa moved in after Snow, her eyes locked onto Sophia. She moved swiftly, trusting in Snow and the others to engage Alek. Her only goal was to reach Sophia. The door leading to the bathroom was her destination.

Sophia was disoriented by the flash bang, but Vanessa had her in arm as she threw her shoulder into the door to knock it open.

Once inside she set Sophia down, crouched over her as she tried to get the chains loose.

"Stay down," she told her daughter. "Whatever happens, stay down."

Bastien was next, moving into the room and circling around the counter that Snow was aiming at, to try and get a bead on Alek with his shotgun while Vanessa disappeared into the bathroom.

The counter acted only as concealment for the storm of bullets that would soon be descending on Alek. Bowen and Léon came in quick on Snow, Vanessa, and Bastien's heels and the moment Sophia was clear the bullets started to fly. Léon was the first to squeeze the trigger and send rounds to the base of the counter. Snow too opened fire, aiming for where he believed Alek to be hiding. He couldn't pinpoint the vampire's exact location by smell alone, but there wasn't a whole lot of counter to cover considering the number of firearms in the room.

The man felt the floors shift with Snow entered the room and prepared to act. However, the first bullet fired caused him to move faster than he anticipated, as it hit his right shoulder. Hissing in pain, he scrambled up taking two more bullets in the ribs, ducking low so he could still use some cover of the counter. He made a run for the window, and firing blindly to the side as he sped past. If he made it to the window, he would jump through it.

Alek would be met with Bastien blocking his path as the werewolf came around the end of the counter, his shotgun pointed at Alek's chest.

His eyes where a swirl of amber as he pulled the trigger, aiming for center mass.

Meanwhile, in the bathroom Vanessa had given up on the chains for the time being as gunfire erupted in the other room. She instead shielded Sophia as they both lay there on the floor, and she kept her hands pressed to her daughters ears as she waited for the inevitable silence that would mean an end to the fight.

Alek bared his teeth at Bastien and and skidded to the left slightly, but not enough. The gun shot grazed his right side and Alek growled in pain, but didn't slow down. He lowered his shoulder down, grabbing Bastien into a bear hug around his waist at full speed, pushing the man through the window, falling through with him. Both men would free fall from the second floor.

Bowen had emptied his weapon and charged Alek as he lunged at the window. Bastien hitting him with the shotgun put him off balance and delayed him just enough to allow him to hook the killer's collar and go out the window with them. He dropped his pistol as he fell and was forced to release Alek. He tucked and rolled through landing, pivoted, and while rising he drew out a thirteen inch khukuri that had been sitting laterally at his belt and across his back in a brown case.

Alek was already starting to rise but would be met with the slash of a high grade carbon steel and silvered blade that could easily be classified as a short sword or a long knife and that had enough weight to hack through a limb with a strong swing.

As Bastien, Bowen and Alek tumbled out the window, Snow rushed over to it to look out and down at them. "The vampire's out front!" he yelled to Vanessa, loud enough to make sure Claire and Julienne heard him from outside the apartment as well, "Take Sophia out the back entrance and get her out of here, I'm going down after them!"

After a moment to survey the descent, Snow strapped his weapon onto his back and vaulted out the window, catching himself on the windowsil rather than freefalling, and making a far more controlled descent than the others to the ground below.

Bastien felt the ground rushing up at him as broken glass rained down around him and Alek before his descent came to an abrupt halt. Having gone out the window backwards, he didn't have the time or positioning to take the fall gracefully, and he groaned in pain as his hand grasped for the shotgun that had landed near him. The deep cuts from the broken glass would heal quickly enough, but broken bones would take longer to reknit.

Meanwhile Julienne had a pistol trained on the both of them from the time Bastien had hit the window, but the lot of them where too close together to fire a shot into the fray without risking hitting either Bastien, or Bowen. She cursed under her breath, hoping for a shot to present itself.

Claire's rifle site had been set on the window, and she now followed the pair as they landed on the concrete two stories down. With Bowen in the way, she couldn't make a clear shot. "Come on, you bastard.." She hissed, her accent thick. It was time to for Claire to get even with Alek, and she at least hoped to put a few holes in the man before someone else ripped his head off.

Alek landed on top of Bastien with a thud, rolling slightly to the side after the landing. He immediately stood up, knowing Bowen had gone down with them. Even if Bastien was partly out of commission for the moment, he knew Bowen had a more 'graceful' landing of the three. Alek caught Bowen in his sight and waited until the last moment to lift his left arm to block the attack from Bowen. At the same time, his right arm was healing at a swift pace and he pulled the trigger of his right gun twice into Bastien, not really aiming at all before Bowen's blade hit Alek's arm.

There was a dull metal sound as Bowen's blade rebounded off a throwing blade hidden inside of Alek's jacket sleeve. Even though he was able to block it, it made him step back several feet as his balance had not fully recovered yet. Alek's golden eyes locked onto Bowen and he aimed his left gun towards the man, firing off several rounds in the attempts to hit Bowen as Alek began to retreat.

Bowen was exceptionally swift and light on his feet but after the initial slash was blocked Alek pulled away. Bowen gave chase and Alek stepped backward over Bastien's prone form faster even than Bowen could step forward from a balanced charge. Since Bowen refused to give quarter Alek raised his weapon point blank and just out of range of the cutting edge of Bowen's khukuri. The vampire proceeded to empty rounds into his chest while stepping backwards.

Three rounds found their mark, but each failed utterly to slow Bowen. As the gun slide reset the third time, Bowen tucked to the left and rolled away, dodging the fourth and fifth rounds. Upon standing Bowen would clench his jaw and ready his knife again. The front of his black button down shirt stuck to his chest but he didn't appear ready to go down by a long shot. Flesh wounds oozed blood before spitting the rounds back out and sealing seconds later.

He knew he needed a distraction to close if he didn't want to be peppered with small caliber rounds again. He readied his handcuffs, flipping them up and into his left hand.

Snow dropped to the ground in a crouch as Alek was unloading his gun into Bowen. He rose to his feet and grabbed the shotgun on his back, taking aim as Bowen rolled to the side, giving him the shot he needed.

He fired, sending a cartridge straight for the vampire's chest. He pumped the weapon to chamber another round and fired again, then again, all the while steadily advancing forwards. Having not suffered any injuries from the fall, his arms were steady and his shots well aimed. There would be no respite for Alek as he was assaulted from multiple sides.

Snow intended to keep firing until either the vampire went down, or he lost the clear shot.

As the gunshots were ringing out around the neighborhood, the noises of battle did not go unheard. Marc had been working another assignment in the district when he heard the shots. Moving in the direction he watched as Alek was in what appeared to be a fatal shoot out. He had a gut feeling that the guy was going to have to be put down and seeing this left Marc with no doubt as to why the vampire was being attacked.

I tried to warn him but it appears this is what he's come to.Marc though as he remove his coat quickly and tossed it to the ground. Marc closed in from yet another direction approaching Alek from a sidewalk keeping a moderate distance. As he was approaching he began to toss three throwing knives of blessed silver aimed for Alek's mid section.

He knew this wasn't the best way to take down someone like this but he couldn't risk any debilitating effects without risking the lives of the others and approaching as an unknown assailant, he wanted to make clear that he was on their side.

Alek's bullets had both struck Bastien, one in the chest, one in the stomach to leave the man writhing on the ground. He managed to roll over onto his side, fingertips outstretched for the shotgun.

His body screamed in protest, and his legs felt leaden and sluggish as he tried to get a hold of his gun.

As his fingers closed around the butt of the weapon he jerked it over to him and rolled onto his back. With shaking arm, he pointed the muzzle at Alek's knee and squeezed the trigger.

The gun recoiled and he let it fall to the ground.

Meanwhile, Julienne still didn't have a clear shot. The lot of them could have been peppering Alek with bullets, had Bowen not engaged him in hand to hand, and now with Snow approaching from the building, she was just as likely to strike him, as she was to hit Alek.

"Fuck me," she bit out.

They had left her, Claire, and Chandler out here in the event Alek tried to escape through the window. They hadn't made plans for everyone to jump out the window after him and put themselves in the line of fire. The pair had effectively rendered her and Claire's position useless unless they wanted to risk friendly fire.

Alexander Meronin stalked through the streets of Lutetia, slipping from shadow to shadow, a wraith in his movements. Refuse lined the streets, the smell wafting up from them horrible, but it did not matter to Alexander. All that mattered was the hunt. Pausing at the corner, he adjusted the leather armor, lines of electronics running along the surface of the garment. Glancing at his forearm, he smiled as he marked the location of the target.


Stumbling, Francis Alfonse fled through the alleyways. Surely it had been long enough that the man wouldn't find him. He was safe, wasn't he? Quivering hands pulled out a cigarette, placing it in his mouth as he extracted the lighter from his chest pocket. Flickering, the cigarette caught fire, dim glow illuminating his face, scarred lines taught with fear. Futilely, he reached inside his coat even as he knew that the gun wouldn't be there.

"Looking for this?" came a voice from behind him. Jumping, he turned to face a young woman standing in the street. She held his pistol in her hands, recognizable by the gilt scroll-work on the barrel.

"Thanks, madame. Much obliged, I am," he muttered around his smoke, accepting the weapon from the girl. Checking the clip, he grinned as he saw the incendiary rounds were still there. Stuffing the gun into his jacket, he pulled out a cell-phone from his pocket. Changing to speed dial, his hands were still moving as a knife took the electronic out of his hands. Starting, he looked in the direction that the knife had come from, seeing nothing but writhing shadows.

Bending down, he reached for the phone while surreptitiously taking hold of his pistol. Whirling, he aimed behind him and saw- nothing. Sweating, he started backing up, only to find himself blocked. A hand covered his mouth while a dagger, cybernetics pulsing, feathered over his neck.

"Won't be needing that, will we?" said the figure. Yelling, a swift cut tore through his jugular; Francis Alfonse fell to the ground, dead.

"I hope someone respected you, Mr. Alfonse. You won't get any from me." Cleaning his dagger on the bodie's coat, Alexander vanished into the night

Bowen had backed from pursuit, but no sooner had he done so did Alek receive a gun shot blast to the chest. The man stumbled back a step or two, coughing and had not yet recovered when another shot came. The third would not hit as he rolled to the side.

No sooner had he regained footing, did three blades get tossed from a direction Alek had not anticipated an attack from. He bared his fangs at Marc. "You traitorous devil!" He gave a choking cry. He ripped the blades from himself, spinning to throw the silver blades towards Snow as hard and as fast as he could.

Bastien's shot took him straight in the knee and he cried out in agony as he fell forward, landing with his hands on the ground.

He was outnumbered and very injured by this point. He had no choice. His eyes caught glimpse of the storm drain, and he took his opportunity. His body seemed to fade away into a red haze that floated in the air where Alek had once knelt. The red haze moved with haste, escaping to the storm drain and the catacombs below the city.

Claire hissed her displeasure, her eyes growing blood red. She raced over to the storm drain and looked at Bowen. "I'm going after him, sir." She said. She would wait for his order, but he would know she could follow Alek closer than anyone at this moment.

Snow swerved to the side, causing two of the knives to miss him entirely. The third hit his arm, eliciting a grunt of pain as it dug into his flesh. When he turned back, it was in time to see Alek shift into a red mist and rush towards a storm drain. He muttered a curse under his breath. Following him down there would be beyond difficult.

He lowered his gun, and lifted his hand to pull the knife out of his arm with a wince. The blade had sunk in fairly deeply, but it didn't seem to be hindering his movement. He tossed the blade aside and moved to crouch beside Bastien to look over his injuries, but before he did, he caught his eyes. They were eyes that said 'I'm fine', before moving towards where Alek had gone.

Snow nodded, before looking to Bowen and VINDEX. He didn't have the brute strength to tear that drain-cover off himself, so they could follow Alek, but he assumed one of the others likely did.

A swift nod to Claire would be enough to let her know to follow Alek. He walked to his gun, replaced his khukuri in the case on the back at his belt, and placed his cuffs in a small case at the front of his right hip. He picked up his pistol and reloaded it as he strode quickly over to a nearby manhole cover in the street. When he got to the cast iron disk he had some trouble getting his fingers under it but once he managed that he lifted it and tossed the one-hundred and twenty pound piece of metal onto the grass with a heave before dropping into the sewers to give chase.

It did not smell terrible down here. Most of the water that flowed outside of pipes and in the trough was just runoff and drainage but rats scattered as he hit the wet cement. The storm drain emptied into this sewer system and if he tracked Claire they would find Alek.

Marc shook his head as Alek made a run into the sewers, he hadn't expected him to go running. He sighed before reaching into his coat and drawing a rather large looking pistol from it's holster. It had three different lights and what appeared to be a small grenade launcher of sorts on the underside. He took a small cylynder and loaded it into the launcher.


"I'm with the Ardelean Society." Marc said loudly as he made his way towards the open storm drain and then dropped down. He added no further explanation. Once he dropped down he flicked on his tactical flashlight and a uv light on his weapon. "I've got your back." Marc shouted ahead to Bowen.

The storm drain appeared to be little more than a long drain pipe that swept rain water out of the city.

However, it had seen far better days and a large portion of the wall had been breached. Much of the crumbled concrete had been long swept away, but heavier blocks of stone and rubble remained yet.

Given the darkened tunnels visible through the breach, the damaged drain pipe no doubt accounted for a lot of the recent flooding in the catacombs.

Julienne was the next to drop down the pipe, after Marc. She landed in a crouch and scented the air.

The scathing warning look she threw Marc said what her lips didn't. Who the fuck are you?

Now wasn't the time to ask questions though, and she moved after Bowen towards the breach into the catacombs where Claire and Alek had slipped through.

Snow dropped into the drain after the others and followed towards the breach. At the mention of the Ardeleans, he grimaced and cast Marc a dirty look, yellow eyes menacing in the dark. But now wasn't the time to create conflict. They had to stay on the vampire's tail without delays like that slowing them down.

With everyone in hot pursuit of Alek, the street was largely clear when Vanessa and Sophia emerged from the building.

"Dad!" Sophia shouted as she pulled away from Vanessa and ran for Bastien.

He was sitting up now and he grunted as Sophia threw her arms around his neck and burried her face against his shoulder. The look in his eyes was almost apologetic as he caught Vanessa looking at him from behind Sophia.

"Sophia, stay with your dad," Vanessa said.

"Vanessa, don'-" Bastien tried to tell her.

She was already jumping down the storm drain after the others.

Vanessa was the first to reach the storm drain, quickly regaining the street as she shouted for Bastien.

He had Sophia sitting in the passenger seat of his car when he stood up from his open door and started towards the storm drain.

"Julienne's hurt," she told him.

Whatever personal issues the two had took second place to the pack for the moment.

"You go up first," Snow said to Marc, "And lift her with you. I'll follow and support her weight."

Marc nodded, "Alright" Marc said has he secured his grip across her, as he carefully used one hand to grip the metal rungs and began to climb up the to the surface slowly.

"Once you're high enough, call for Vanessa and Bastien to help pull her up." Snow said as he followed, bearing the brunt of Julienne's weight across his upper arm and shoulders.

The rough jostling was only making the nausea worse, and Julienne did her best to maintain pressure on the wound while they were trying to regain the street, but a wash of dizziness swept over her. Her hand fell away to leave the coat fluttered down past Snow.

As Leon and Bastien helped pull her to the surface and onto the street she had lost consciousness. Bastien pressed a hand to her throat, feeling for a pulse before throwing Snow the keys to his car.

"Get the car started," he said as he moved to help get Julienne into the back seat.

"Mr. Barnes! Grab an IV bag, blood block, and anything else you need out of the car to make sure she makes it to Cornell's alive.", called up Bowen from the hole. Once Julienee was up and on her way to their car Léon would run ahead and grab medical supplies from one of the Vindex cars. Unless someone stopped him he would meet them back at their car as they put Julienee in. The back seat would get very crowded as Léon applied blood block in coupious amounts to her neck wound. The substance, invented by Titus Gable would react with the blood that still pumped from her neck and start to seal the wound, preventing further blood loss. She had still lost a lot of blood. Léon would then start to prep the IV bag to get fluids back into her system.

Bowen needed Claire's and Chandler's help to heft Alek from the sewers and by the time they made it back on the street the Bloodstone wolves would be on their way to Cornell's with Julienee.

Claire was struggling by this point. The scent of blood was heavy in the air and she had been nearly close to feeding before. She now -needed- to feed. Her strength was sapped, but she helped haul Alek out of the hole either way. Alek took note of her lack of strength, and grinned.

"You're still fighting it, aren't you..? I'm proud of you, m'dear. You've accomplished something I never could." Alek said to her. Claire grounded her teeth. "But you do know.. You still belong to me..." Alek said quietly. "I belong to no one." Claire growled through grit teeth.

"And especially not to a monster like you.." Claire pulled away as soon as Alek was out and Chandler and Bowen could take care of Alek themselves. Alek's eyes glowed slightly and Claire halted in her tracks. Claire could feel his control over her still and she fought against it. This was not a vampiric power. Claire had been turned by the blood of this master vampire and had not broken his hold on her.

"Mr. Davion.. Mr. Ombre.." Claire managed to choke out, closing her eyes. Alek was speaking to her through her mind now. What little color drained from her face. Her hand reached for her side arm.

Bowen half carried and half pushed Alek to his car, throwing him in the back seat and slamming the door while he listened to Alek's and Claire's words for each other. The car would roar to life a moment later and speed away from the scene unless stopped by Claire or someone else.

Chandler was standing next to Claire and when she started to reach for her gun he laid his hand gently over her weapon. "Ma cheré...", he said almost at a whisper. Blood still dripped from his cheeks where his geist had cut into his skin. It was unlikely he could stop her if she really wanted her gun.

Claire was physically shaking by this point. Her hand reached for the holster of her gun just as Chandler's hand reached over it. The touch was enough to grab her attention. She turned her red glaring eyes to him and focused on the blood that dripped down his cheek.

She finally released a breath as Bowen was out of sight and out of range. "You're lucky your blood is toxic to me, Mr. Ombre.." She whispered. "Otherwise I'd probably would have had you right here and now.." She grinned slightly and walked away.

To be honest, she was still disturbed how close she had become to losing herself to Alek again. "Just goes to show I cannot get away.." She whispered to herself as she walked towards her car.