Order of Business

Ignoring the grumblings and complaints from the six vampires in the red Chevy Suburban, Marc Antony was experiencing the most recent pleasure in a life often dictated by the pursuit of pleasure. Opening the second of his treasured bags he removed what had to be a high-watermark achievement for mankind. "Big-Mac..." taking a large bite, but heroically not letting that stop him from telling everyone about it he continued, "It is ambrosia, tell me, Meyer, are these delicacies known to the chefs at the forum?"

"You're killing me with those, man!" Morte D'amour's representative, chosen when the other councilors realized that Belle and the Dragon were sending their own, replied back to the ancient Roman. "I haven't been dead that long. I'd kill to taste a damn cheeseburger again." The tall gray haired former U.S. marine sergeant major sat in the driver's seat as he was the only one on this team who had ever driven a vehicle before and had become the official interpreter of modern technology.

They had obtained the conveyance after coming through what Vladimir had sworn was an unknown entrance to the Shadow Roads. After securing themselves the supplies needed with the criminal's help, Arturo's vampire wife Clovis returned with Vlad back to their own world, literally a reality away.

"Two all beef patties, special sauce, lettuce, cheese..," Marc read from the bag as he stuffed his mouth with french fries. "I see nothing in this recipe that Chef Armand should not be able to procure...What is the special sauce, Meyer?"

"A mystery that shall remain one, I fear," Captain Maruk al Bandi interrupted before the American could. "Can we please stop talking about mortal food?" Maruk was unhappy, they had been sitting in this smelly wagon for an hour now watching for Vlad's promised slayers. He claimed that this spot was on one of their usual patrols. It was the third night they had spent in the city, waiting. Vlad had been insistent that they stay away from the SDW building and anywhere else the senior slayers might be as they could sense vampires from a great distance and until everyone learned more about their capabilities, there was too great a chance for failure.
To add to the boredom, Marc Antony took great pleasure in every new thing he discovered and then annoyingly described to the rest of them what they were missing. The Dragon's former Gaullic Chieftain Gaskar, was likely chosen to be an annoyance to Marc and the Traveler's Benedict, a former Crusader was clearly chosen to be an insult to himself. Padma's chief hunter Murillo and his Beast-to-Call, the werewolf Kain, insisted on fresh meals every night instead of being content with the servants and other renters at the small motel they had commandeered. The werewolf was now back at that motel, watching over their hideaway. And then of course Arturo, Belle's enormous Frenchman whined constantly about every little thing as soon as his wife Clovis had departed with Vlad for France. Allah, save me from my allies, he thought as he sat there trying not to listen as the marine was explaining to Marc about the characters on his food containers.

"Is there no Constable to deal with the Ham-burglar?" Marc asked perplexed as to why anyone would celebrate a common thief. If he were the king president of this land they could celebrate his heroic image instead of... "Hello there," he interrupted his own train of thoughts as a pair of young females strolled around the corner, down the street a block away from them. A tall fair skinned vision of golden hair and lush curves sauntered confidently alongside of a Nubian acrobat, the dark girl was casually walking along the top of a narrow fence.

"No one react, let us observe them for a moment," Maruk commanded as Arturo and Gaskar were attempting to defeat the auto-locking mechanism on the Suburban's rear doors.

"Aim the yellow end at them and pull the trigger," Meyer explained quickly as he handed out the stun guns to everyone but Arturo and Gaskar, their assignment being to actually engage the females so that the others could take them down without harming them, and Murillo, who had his own custom tranquilizer pistol. "If they keep resisting, keep pulling the trigger, you'll get a few more charges before the battery dies out," Meyer continued as he focused intently on the mission and tried desperately to ignore the fact that the blond resembled his own daughter, forever to be separated from him for her own safety.

"Everyone, get ready, remember, according to the outlaw, they will not know what we are at first, so do not waste the element of surprise," Maruk commanded. "Whoever messes this up will answer to the praetor and the council..."

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"No, the big bad didn't know about any of that, he could just tell that she was something special," Rami explained the current scuttlebutt at the company to her tall sister slayer.

"Zombie alligators, how cool is that, we miss all the good stuff. I'd have liked to see Buffy unleashed." Jenn noticed a giant dude walking on the sidewalk ahead of them.

"Ripped his heart out and took a bite, Rami said. "That's what Blake said anyway...That guy could almost be dangerous if it wasn't for the alternative lifestyle beret." Rami caught sight of a Grizzly Adams type on the other side of the street, she hopped off the fence and silently signaled her partner that something was up.

"Big dudes, but straight human..," Jenn reported, her senses for creatures of the night were better than Rami's. The two slayer's instincts and training kicked in seamlessly and Rami casually watched Mr.Hairy while Jenn was responsible for Andre the Gay Giant. Just as she was about to whisper her nickname for him to Rami, a door to a small building opened and a blue jeans and leather jacket wearing hottie holding a McDonald's cup of coffee stepped out onto the sidewalk between her and the beret dude. The tall guy immediately lumbered into Hotstuff and started pounding on him, sending the coffee cup spraying all over the concrete. "Holy shit!" she yelled as Rami took off to intercept Mr.Hairy as he was trying to join the stomp-down. She charged forward and shoved the big guy away from the victim, pushing him behind her as three more guys came out of the alley and circled them. "I don't know what's going on here but it's over now," she announced, and as she was about to continue she noticed that all of them, including Hotstuff behind her, had on identical new combat boots...

"Whoa there, big boy!" Rami called out as she blocked the pro wrestler-looking guy in the street. Her senses began to tingle about something and just as she was about to warn Jenn, a red fletched dart appeared in her chest. Yanking it out, she turned to see three more guys surrounding Jenn and the vic'. The big guy pounced on her quicker than he should have been able to and drove her to the ground. She could feel the drug in her system but knew it wouldn't be enough, her slayer could feel the guy now...he was a vampire! "VAMPS, JENN!" she screamed, bucking him off of her and springing to her feet just to get another dart in her chest...

"VAMPS, JENN!" Hotstuff grabbed her in a bearhug from behind at the yelled warning. Using his obviously non-human strength for leverage, she pushed back against him and launched her feet into Beret vamp, sending him crashing into a parked car. Slamming her head backwards, she felt Hotstuff's nose explode and broke free just as Goatee man connected a devastating right hook to her chin, sending her down to the ground. Buzz-cut dude jumped on her and straddled her chest as he tried to control her hands. Instantly bringing her legs up, she wrapped her feet around his neck and launched him off of her backwards, she then foot swept one of them before spinning back to her feet. She turned aside from Goatee's second punch and belted Beret with her own right uppercut, stunning him. Electricity coursed through her as four electrodes landed in her back. Screaming, she fell to her knee...

One shot was enough for all but the largest male lions, two shots were sufficient for all but a large tigress protecting her cubs, three shots would take down everything including Black rhinos and African elephants...
The Black demoness had taken four of his darts and was still dueling with Gaskar. Murillo had only brought seven of the darts. The others would have to handle the blond, he thought as he paused loading the fifth dart and watched in disbelief as the girl pounded her fists on the chieftain's chest like jackhammers, then ducked under his lunge and drove upwards grabbing his head and viciously wrenched it in a full circle before ripping it right off in a spray of gore that Padma would be proud of. His fumbling fingers dropped the dart and he knew fear as he scrambled for it as the nightmare woman turned her bloodied face and looked right at him...

Benedict approached the downed blond and made to bash her with the Louisville Slugger wooden club he had found at the motel, when she proved to be faking her distress. She twisted around and launched upwards, driving both of her hands right into his stomach and curved them upwards to grasp at his cold heart. He had a moment to look into her furious eyes and say "Thank you," before the spark of his life died forever when she ripped his heart out of him. Beret, Buzz-cut and a roaring Goatee all plowed into her and she fell in a mass of grappling limbs. Struggling to free herself, she was about to call out for Rami when Bloody Nose's face appeared inches from her own.

"Bloody hell, but your an amazing girl," he said and the words seemed to increase in weight and she found herself exploring the depths of his eyes. Realizing the trap, she pulled against the draw of the other entity from far away that she could sense in Bloody Nose's gaze. She tried to scream, tried to warn Rami, tried to break that fur-lined net that had wrapped around her mind and somehow lulled her slayer into ignoring the threat. She could do nothing but look into his blue eyes and scream inside as her body lost it's tension, and even as Bloody Nose...Marcus, the voice in her mind corrected her, tried to stop the others as they bit whatever parts of her body that they had access to and drank her blood and one even was breaking her fingers in anger, she could only lay there, take whatever they wanted to do to her and pray that those blue eyes wouldn't leave, because then she would be alone...

Murillo hit the slowed and staggering monster with the fifth dart before dropping his pistol and answering her charge. Screaming out for help from the others. Surely all of them together had the blond subdued by now! he thought as he made to grab her hands, but even drugged, she evaded him and struck out, pounding two of her fingers into his eyes and as she rode him to the ground and tried to dig his eyeballs out he could feel her biting and ripping at his throat with her other hand. Unable because of the searing pain to do anything but flail around, his mind filled with primal images, lions eating a hippo calf alive and zebras being torn apart by crocodiles and as he felt his throat give way and her fingers push into his brain, he imagined that a great black tigress had culled him from the herd and he was a spectator to his own demise as that great predator ate him alive. He had enough time to think that Padma would punish his loved ones for his failure before the cold crawl of darkness edged his awareness into oblivion...

The impact from dead Benny's bat sounded like a shotgun blast as Meyer slammed it alongside of the last upright girl's head. As the bat exploded into two pieces, the girl fell unconscious on top of what remained of the Master of Beast's top hunter. "Son of a bitch, Captain! If Antony couldn't have pulled that trick, we'd still be fighting the blond, and then this one would've joined in." He struggled to slow his breathing, having not yet broken himself of the mortal habit. He'd seen a lot of tough men in the Marine Corps and even tougher monsters since that black day years ago in Germany, but he had never seen anything like the destroyers that these two kids were.

Maruk looked at the carnage. He had clearly underestimated them and now three important vampires lay dead and the blame could fall on no-one but him. Arturo was searching for Gaskar's head to load it into the Suburban with the rest of the Gaul's body. Antony nursed the golden haired valkyrie towards the truck as she clung to his arm as if he were the last safe thing in the world and Meyer was applying something called Duct tape heavily on the black warrior's limbs, though Maruk was skeptical that the shiny silver cloth could hold her ferocious strength.
He knew that they had to get to the motel soon, if Murillo's beast hadn't died with him, they would have to subdue it before the wolf brought attention upon them and they needed to use the hide-away to spend the day once more before making it to the entrance to the Shadow Road and then to go home and face whatever punishment the master's would demand for this catastrophe. He started to collect pieces of Murillo to add them to the growing pile of former acquaintances in the back of the vehicle.

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Rami woke up snarling, she was bound in tape, coated in drying blood and laying in a small bathroom. She mentally cataloged her injuries and tested the bonds holding her. All she could do was hope that Jenn had gotten away and was okay. She noticed that one of her boots had been taken by these vampires, vampires that she couldn't sense until they were right on top of her and who were faster and stronger than any she had ever fought before.
She heard whimpering and rolled over to see a large bald heavily tattooed man wrapped in the same duct tape. There were tear tracks down his face and she realized that he was a werewolf just as a sorrowful howl sounded out softly from his throat. "Hey, Buddy...how about rolling over here and chewing through some of this tape? I'll untie you as soon as I'm free..," she asked him as his head slowly raised up and the look of pure unadulterated loathing in his eyes made her fall silent. "Okay, never-mind then." Well, hell, she thought...

The motel room door opened and Meyer came in just before the break of dawn as Marc was idly tracing the bare flesh around Jennilee Hawser's bra, making her purr and causing her nipples to tighten under the lace. "You have a beautiful name, Jennilee," he said softly as he brought his fingers up to trace the lines of her angelic face.

"Why did he take my shirt?" she asked dreamily, distantly aware that she should be mad about that shirt for some reason. His soft hand curved around her face and tilted her head back as he came closer to run his lips over hers.

"I am sorry about the tunic...the shirt," he answered. "It was needed so that your friends wouldn't worry about you. But I am no gentleman, forgive me, beautiful one." He took off his own leather jacket and wrapped it around her and kissed her forehead. "I will dress you in riches when we get you home, like you deserve...a Princess, my princess."

"That's okay," she murmured, truly touched that this wonderful man felt sorry for her being exposed. I think I'm falling in love, she thought happily. I can't wait to tell Rami that he thinks I'm a princess...Where is Rami? The question briefly held in her mind until her prince kissed her deeply...

Maruk watched as he sat against the wall waiting for dawn to take him, he watched Antony caress the most amazing young woman he had ever seen in his entire life. A true warrior and as beautiful as any of the legendary Persian queens of old. He had to admit to himself that he was jealous as the Roman kissed her softly. If he survived the coming council meeting with his job and life intact, he would try to keep the woman in one piece throughout whatever trials the council would put her through and he would beg his master Cicero's support in a bid for her in front of the council. From the first day he had served, he had never questioned an order nor asked for any reward, but he would do so now and when she kissed him it would be because she wanted to, not because Cicero had rolled her mind through his servant's eyes...