Thanks to those who've commented. Any comments or critiques are most than welcome: hope people are enjoying this somewhat so far. A note on dialogue: some of it does come straight from the game (as I remember it), but most of it is mine.


"Hello again." I waved as I approached. "So what's going on?"

Fat Larry looked around and then leaned forward. "Baby-girl, yo, here's what's going down. Word is, Chinatown Tong and some local boys are doing a bidness deal at the bottom o' a parking garage tonight. Now, I don't know what they be exchanging, but let's just say a certain client o' mine is willing to put down some super-size green fo' it. You get it fo' me, I not only give you a cut, but Ah'll get you a discount on my special stock as well. You in?"

This was a little more than I'd bargained for. "How many men?" I asked suspiciously.

"Ohh, 20-25 max." said Larry airily.

I clapped my palm to my forehead in a gesture of disbelief. "Seriously. And what makes you think I can get past that many dudes?"

Larry's eyes narrowed and his grin was sinister. "Cos you got stone cold killa written all over you, baby."

This made me pause. Was he hinting that he knew I was a vampire? Or was he just trying to butter me up? I decided it didn't matter. Whether I wanted to pay LeCroix off quickly, or merely get a place to stay, I needed money, and lots of it. Maybe I could find a way to sneak around and not have to fight much.

"I'll do it." I declared firmly. "But only if I can get some weapons up-front. On credit."

I wasn't prepared for Larry's extreme response. He let out a cry and his face became almost apoplectic.

"Yo, baby-girl, why you gotta do me like that? I'z just tryin' ta make a living here." He sighed as I shook my head stubbornly. "Fine, you be dat way. What you need?"

I ended up with a sword which he assured me came straight from Japan, but looked a little shaky. Still, it gave me more reach that the knife I carried in Santa Monica, yet was small enough to mostly conceal on my back. It came with a special ninja-style strap sheath. I made sure I fitted it under my t-shirt out of sight of Larry's mirror, and then headed off.

The meet was supposed to be happening at midnight, still an hour away, but Larry told me they would already have guards there. When he'd first mentioned the whole thing, I'd wondered if he meant my hideout parkade, but this one was in the opposite direction, next to an abandoned movie theatre. With a shock I realised it was the movie theatre I'd watched my sire die in. It gave me a creepy feeling of having completed a circle. I'd first come there as prey, but now I returned as predator.

It's ok, I'll sneak through vents, I comforted myself. It seemed odd to be thinking that having to only kill a couple of guys was acceptable. Shrugging off my mood, I scoped out the outside of the parking garage. As I'd hoped, there was a ventilation system that led to the outside. I ripped off the metal grille over one and climbed in. It was a little smaller than my hideout one, so that I was shuffling along on my stomach using my elbows, rather than crawling. I would've felt very ninja-like if it hadn't been for the fact that I was wearing a stupid pink t-shirt and the hilt of my sword kept smacking off the ceiling of the vent. I felt like I was being hideously noisy, and kept stopping every 5 seconds to listen for any sign that I'd been discovered.

Soon I started to hear signs that the parking garage was occupied: low voices and the sounds of patrols. I squinted through a crack in the metal, trying to get a glimpse of someone, but all I could see was a car roof. Edging forward as quietly as I could, I started on the downward slope to the next level. Larry had said the briefcase I was after would be exchanging hands on the bottom level.

It seemed like it took ages to crawl down three levels of vents, especially since every time I heard someone walking close, I had to stop and check that they hadn't heard me. I was heartily sick of the vents by the time I reached my goal, and swore I wouldn't sleep in one again. But for the time being, I had run out of crawlspace, so I peeked against a crack again, and tried to see what was going on.

Just in my range of vision I could see a man's legs. He was wearing a suit and polished shoes. I felt very frustrated that I couldn't see the rest of him, and then it hit me: I could've used auspex this whole time to see exactly where everyone was. Cursing my stupidity, I burned a little blood and instantly the scene below me jumped into glowing clarity.

Frustration was replaced by anxiety. There were a lot of men down there, all armed. They were all only humans, but a lot of the Tong seemed to have automatic weapons, which I hadn't faced before. Right now they were pointing them at the gangbangers they were doing the deal with, but I had no doubt that the moment I entered the scene, I would become everyone's primary target. I lay there, racking my brains on the best way to do this. I could see a grille in the bottom of the vent ahead, so I crawled towards it, hoping that the echoing footsteps of the patrols would cover up my noise.

The grille opened above a corner of the parking garage. Below me a gang member in a red bandana shuffled his feet and muttered about rats. He was alone, and in shadow. Cautiously I flipped the grate open, but it gave a loud clang as it swung against metal.

"What was that?"

I'd ducked back out of sight as soon as it opened, and I could see the red glow of his body as he looked up.

"What's up bro?" came a call from the middle distance.

"Rats; fucking rats." Replied my target, turning away.

Seizing my opportunity, I dove out of the hole in the vent and rolled behind a car as soon as I hit the ground. It was lucky that I was small; getting stuck halfway would've been awful. As it was, the hilt of my damn sword banged a tire and rebounded a little, smacking me in the head. My targeted gang member jumped and looked up at the grate suspiciously.

"Hurry the fuck up boss, this place gives me the creeps." He muttered under his breath.

I stifled a giggle and then felt a wash of cold sobriety flow over me. After all, I was planning to kill this guy, and there was a good chance his friends would fill me full enough of bullets to give me the final death. I couldn't help feeling sorry for him as I carefully unsheathed my sword and crept closer.

Now I was out from behind the car, although still hidden by shadows, and I could see the knot of men out in the open, counting money over a briefcase laid in front of them. I returned focus to my antsy gang member. I meant to stealth kill him, but at the last moment I had a spasm of conscience and merely rapped him hard on the back of the head with the sword's hilt. Catching him as he collapsed, I pulled him round behind the car and waited to see if anyone noticed. So far so good, although I knew at some point I was going to have to engage them all in order to get that briefcase. I considered taking my sleeping friend's semi-automatic, but Jack had only shown me how to use a pistol. I wasted a good minute trying to figure out what was the safety and then gave up.

So I'd have to rely on vampiric disciplines. Breathing deeply in an effort to gain courage, I flicked the mental switch that gave me blood shield. Instantly, I was covered in a shimmer of crimson. I stood up, oriented myself towards the briefcase, and ran out into the middle of them, screaming my lungs out.

Chaos erupted in a sparking hail of bullets. Happily a lot of them weren't coming in my direction. My sudden appearance caused a lot of confusion and fear, and for some reason the local gang seemed to think I was on the Tong's side. Shouts of "ambush!" and "it's a trap!" filled the air as I cannonballed into the Tong exchange man and snagged the briefcase, scattering bills everywhere. I felt a pang over all that floating money, but there was no time to stop. The Tong men were a little less confused than the other gang, and I quickly found myself being backed against a car by a group of four, while their companions returned fire on their former colleagues.

The four started shooting at me, but my vampiric senses were in full fight mode, and the bullets seemed slower than bees buzzing by me. I ducked and grabbed one's leg, throwing him off his feet. I spun him by that leg, using his flailing body as both weapon and shield. This knocked one of them flying, and dropped my human baseball bat in a crumpled heap on the floor. A bullet whined and careened off my blood shield, striking one of my attackers in the jaw. The sight of his face erupting in red flesh and white bone horrified me, even as my vampire instincts relished the spray of blood spattering my face and hair. Suddenly all I could feel was hunger, and I found myself leaping on the last of the four, burying my fangs in his neck.

By now the others on this level were aware of me, and I only managed a few moments of feeding before my dinner was shot multiple times in the back. I spun away, allowing him to collapse, and slashed wildly at my closest attacker. The sword buried itself in his shoulder and then snapped with a loud ping as it met bone. Grrr, I thought, as I rushed inside his guard and stabbed at his chest. The broken hilt sliced and skittered across his breastbone, shaking itself out of my grip. Cursing Larry's shoddy goods under my breath, I scooped up the briefcase (I'd dropped it when I fed) and dashed behind a pillar.

Shuddering with adrenaline and panic, I glanced about wildly for an escape route. If I hadn't already used so much blood on auspex and shield, I might've considered going back into the fray and blood purging everyone in sight. However, I could feel the hunger inside threatening to break my control; frenzy lurked in my guts, waiting for an opportunity to take over.

To my right I could see the door to the exit stairs. It was now unguarded, but to get to it I would have to run past about eight people trying to stop me. And if one of them thought to get on a cel phone and warn a buddy upstairs, then I could be quickly cut off. All this passed through my mind in the few seconds that it took my attackers to venture round my pillar. I decided I had no choice, and gripping the briefcase tightly, sprinted for the door, weaving as much as I could to avoid bullets.

The noise of that many guns firing was cacophonous, but I was hit less than I thought I'd be. Most of the bullets grazed off me or whined past my hair. The worst was one which nicked me in the leg, forcing me to tumble and roll, jumping up to smack the door open with the briefcase. The door slammed against the wall and I dove through it, hitting my shins on the first step on the other side.

I dodged to the side, pulling the door closed as I did so. The handle was slippery; I leaned against the closed door to get myself together and noticed that my body was smearing the metal dull with rusty blood. Mine or someone else's: I couldn't tell. All my frantic energy left me, and suddenly I felt weary enough to stop and sleep right there. Heaving a sigh, I straightened up and started to jog up the steps, alert to any sound of pursuit or ambush. It wasn't long before I heard the echo of angry voices below me. I quickened my pace, pushing past my weariness. By the sounds of it, I was two floors above them, and near the exit. Looking up, a square grate near the ceiling caught my eye. It looked just big enough for me to hide in. It was hard work right then to take the grille off, manoeuvre the brief case in length wise, and then jump and drag myself in after it. I knew I was leaving the tell-tale grille on the ground, but there was no help for it, no time to go back.

I pushed the briefcase along, praying that it didn't get stuck when the vent turned upwards at a right angle, heading for the roof. Luckily there was just room for it, and after wriggling for a little longer the briefcase popped out into open air, and I followed it in a sprawl of limbs. I'd made it to the roof of the parking garage. The air smelt very sweet and a puff of night breeze caught my hair. The tarmac and grit of the roof's surface was rough and solid under my fingers. I laughed for the sheer joy of still existing, and jumped off the roof into a deserted alleyway. From there it was easy to blend into the shadows; I heard the angry voices rise in bewilderment as I left them behind.

Halfway through the maze of alleys to Larry's, my adrenalin exultation slipped away, and I had to stop and crouch behind a dumpster while the shakes gripped me. Each time I went into battle, my vampire instincts took over, disregarding any morals or empathy in favour of survival. But once things were over, I experienced the full horror of it: I crouched there with my chin on my knees, my mind replaying the violence in lurid detail. The only thing which made me feel better was the fact that I'd managed to deliberately not kill a couple.

After a long time, I stood up, wiped my bloody hair out of my eyes, and continued on to Larry.