ArchivedLogs:Unrelenting

Unrelenting
Dramatis Personae Dusk, Isra
In Absentia	2014-04-11 '
Location <NYC> BoM Safehouse - Lower East Side
Tucked away off a little-used side street in the Lower East Side, sandwiched between a youth drop-in center and a taqueria, this narrow three-story townhouse has very little to catch the eye. Boarded-up windows, a door peeling its paint, shabby grubby brickface; from the outside it does not look like much. Inside someone has gone to great lengths to renovate the building into something more habitable. It isn't glamorous but it is comfortable, old furniture dragged in, the place generally swept clean. The first floor holds a large living room, a smaller dining room, a spacious kitchen, a half-bathroom. There are three bedrooms and a full bathroom on the second floor; the attic is just a large empty space crammed full of boxes with a window out to the large flat roof. The basement, much like the attic, consists of a lot of empty space. A bare concrete floor, no windows, occasional poles running up to the ceiling. A tiny half-bathroom down here, too. Not a whole lot else. The attic of the Safehouse is a cluttered-dark place. Boxes stacked on boxes, a few windows that let in dim light; there are some naked bulbs up here, though they haven't been turned on. Not that this bothers its current sole occupant. It isn't set up to /be/ living quarters, but Dusk has tucked himself far into the back, a kind of nook set up made of two half-walls of boxes and one /actual/ wall made up of the back wall of the attic. There were extra queen-sized futon mattresses being stored up here and he's spread a couple of them out, now, from where they /had/ been stacked atop each other in a tall pile. Now they're a -- slightly less tall pile, three high, two wide. On occasion he's crept out from his sequestration to shower. He smells of Old Spice, mostly, and cinnamon-clove toothpaste. Past that he hasn't left, much. His backpack, packed full of laptop and the thrift-store accumulation that is his sole remaining possessions in the aftermath of the Lofts-explosion, sits beside the mattresses. /He/ lies atop them, right now, on his side, back facing the back wall, in black jeans and a Columbia t-shirt, eyes oddly sunken-misshapen. Closed, but they always are, now. Shoulders curled very faintly inward. Isra has come bearing bags of mezze, leaving most of it on the kitchen counter, allergen information written on each paper bag in meticulous cursive. She brings one small bag with her, redolent of strong, sweet spices, and heads for the attic. A soft scuffle on the steps precedes a knock at the door. "It's Isra. May I come in?" She sounds as though she is about to add something else, but does not. Dusk's head turns vaguely in the direction of the door, week-old beard rasping against the mattress he lies on. There's only silence to answer Isra's query, and for a while silence is all she gets. But, eventually, there is slow shifting on the mattress. A soft and uneven pad of limping-unsteady footsteps treading a careful path through the room. Dusk opens the door a crack before making his way back; his steps are uneven, favouring his left leg heavily. He picks his way slowly through the clutter, dropping back down onto the mattress and crawling back to his spot against the wall in the same silence. Isra enters with tremendous care, compressing her sinuous body down into a half-crouch and folding her wings in tight behind her. Even so, her horns scrape the rafters above and her tail thuds into the boxes on either side when she pauses to close the door behind her. She picks her way over to Dusk and sinks down beside the bank of mattresses. The paper bag rustles in her hand. "I brought you ma'amool. Pastries. They're stuffed with fruits and nuts. You needn't--" Her voice trails off into a peculiar, low thrumming. A rhythmic tapping against the floor gives away the agitated twitching of her tail. "I'd just like to stay here with you for a while." Here, too, there is silence. As Isra approaches Dusk's head tips; there is a noticeable vibration from the very prominent ridge of larger-than-average Adam's apple in his throat but whatever sound it makes is inaudible to most ears. It stops; Dusk still, though, says nothing. When Isra sinks down nearby there is a reflexive twitch of Dusk's shoulder, habitual, muscle flexing; his breath catches when this entirely fails to produce the desired result. He lets the breath back out shakily, and simply nods. Though the darkness is nearly complete, Isra's hand tightens around the bag again, long talons piercing the much-abused paper effortlessly this time. She sets the sweets down near the head of the mattress and sits down on the edge of it herself, wings relaxing out to mantle over them. Her hand reaches out, hesitates, then comes to rest on his arm. The touch sets Dusk's muscle twitching again, a small flex of shoulder that curls and relaxes, curls -- His teeth clench, hard, and his breath whistles out through his gritted fangs. His fingers curl into a fist, pressed up against his chest. Then slowly flatten open, palm resting there a long heavy moment. Beneath Isra's talons, his muscles are clenched hard. His flattened palm shifts, rubbing in a slow circle once, and stopping. Isra waits for him to settle again, and runs the same hand along his arm, down to cover his hand. The low thrumming sound in her throat is like the faintest purr on a slow playback. She settles one wing down over Dusk and gathers him toward her--firmly, though not insistently. Dusk pulls in a slow ragged breath as Isra's wing settles over him. At first his body is rigid, beneath her wing, his breathing stilled. It is a long moment before he swallows, turning -- first his face inward, to press his cheek up against the enveloping leathery skin, a tremor shuddering through him. Slowly the rest of him turns inward towards her as well. Still stiff, but breathing once more. The wing shivers when he touches it, but then curls around him tighter. Isra brings her other hand up to the back of Dusk's head, guiding him to lean against her. Her fingers curl inward, pressing sharp talons against his skin, but she stops herself before they draw blood. Save for the swishing of her tail, she goes quite still, like a statue of flesh and blood. Beneath the hard muscles of her chest, however, her heart pounds hard and fast. The pounding in Isra's chest quickens Dusk's breath. He leans in closer, head tipping upward until his shorter faster breaths come hot against the pounding pulse in Isra's neck. Against her side, his own chest is heaving. Though it makes little difference to either of them, Isra closes her eyes. A bass rumble rises from deep in her throat, like the idling of an unfamiliar engine or the purring of a monstrous cat. Her other wing wraps around them, pulling Dusk closer even as she leans into him, pressing her neck to his lips. Against Isra's skin, Dusk's lips part. The press of his fangs is quick and deep, a sudden sharp stab of pain that sinks swift into Isra's throat. It is as ever followed by the near-euphoric rush that his bite carries with it, not eclipsing the pain so much as just spicing it. Dusk's lips press flush up against her skin, tongue lapping against puncture wounds as blood begins to flow. His hand curls up against her chest, palm resting over her heart and fingers clenching in tight grip into the fabric of her clothing. His breathing only quickens, now, as he drinks, sharp teeth not entirely withdrawing as they usually do but digging in just a little harder. Isra sucks in a sharp breath when Dusk's fangs dig into her flesh, but she does not pull away. Her hand tightens reflexively at the nape of his neck, then relaxes, the calloused pads of long fingers rubbing slow circles against his trapezius. The rumbling in her throat grows louder and more resonant. Her pulse races and her body flushes with warmth that radiates through the thin, peachy fabric of her wrap dress. Dusk drinks. And drinks, and drinks; normally very conscientious about /stopping/ at a safe point for his donors, today he does not show any signs of doing so. Just keeps his mouth pressed up hard -- harder -- keeps his grip tight. His face is flushed, now, where before it was deathly-pale, chest still heaving with the strong-fast breaths he pulls in against her side. Very gradually, Isra goes from holding Dusk against her to leaning on him. She has, after all, a good deal more blood in her body than the average human, but even so she is beginning to fade. Her breathing slows, and her hand slips from his neck to his back, rubbing between his shoulder blades. "Dusk." She breathes the name, barely even voicing. "Stop." Dusk's fangs stay buried in Isra's neck, pressed in against the torn skin. His shoulders quiver, scarred muscles tensed and shaking under where her hand rubs. He pulls in breath quickly at the sound of his name -- but pulls in a hard /swallow/, too, rich hot blood filling his mouth, tongue stroking against skin, lips sealed tight and his knuckles pressed up against her sternum where his hands still grip her dress hard. Isra's head dips and comes to rest on Dusk’s shoulder. She shudders when his tongue passes over her neck. "I love you," she whispers, her knuckles dig hard into his back, "but I will make you relent if I must, and that may not prove pleasant." A warning growl creeps into the lower register of her voice. Dusk's shoulders twitch again, at that growl, rippling in habitual flex of muscles that -- have nothing attached to them, scarred tissue jerking uselessly. Tensing hard, relaxing. His teeth press in harder, mouth sucking in another swallow, almost desperately. Silent, except for the soft sucking of mouth against skin. Isra sighs and, with some effort, slides her hand back up to the base of Dusk's neck. Her other hand joins it from the ventral side, thumb and middle finger pressing into his carotid arteries, none too gently. Her wings press in harder to keep him from struggling. All in all, she seems very calm about this procedure, as choking someone out were some exceedingly common variety of social interaction. Dusk, oddly enough, doesn't even seem to attempt a struggle, here. He does /tense/, hard and stiff, but he doesn't /fight/ this. Just fastened in against Isra's neck -- for a few more seconds, at least, before the grip of his hand slackens and the seal of his lips against Isra's neck breaks with a shuddery-shaky exhale. His muscles go slack, the hard clamp of his fangs loosening as his body drapes in against hers, the release of tension giving him an odd sense of /calm/ for the first time since she arrived. Isra keeps her hands precisely where they are for a good thirty seconds longer before relaxing her grip. Though swaying and quite near to unconsciousness, she does not seem excessively concerned about the blood trickling down her neck--it is /trickling/, after all. Her hands relax, one cradling his head and the other sliding down to support his torso. She unfurls one wing to brace against the mattress and eases them both down. A shudder runs through her, but she sheds no tears as she drifts off to sleep. Dusk, well-/fed/ if temporarily incapacitated, is a good deal quicker to stir. Still just as silent as before, when he wakes; though his sunken eyelids never open it's immediately easy to tell from the abrupt tension in his form, the quickening of his breath. He pushes himself upright on the mattress, still for a very long while. Listening, in the dark, to Isra's breathing beside him, his shoulders trembling but his face blank. Eventually there's a reverberation in his throat as he pushes himself to his feet, carefully stepping over Isra, limping his way out to the window to climb out onto the roof, and leave Isra to sleep alone in the musty-dark attic.