Many thanks to my lovely interim beta, Pepper9873 :)

Fandom: The Gates

Title: Deep in the Wilds of Suburbia

Pairings: Canon

Rating: Call it PG-13

Summery: What if the paranormals had no more clue about each other's presence in the Gates than the Monahans do? Devon gets into some bad Juju and Nick and Dylan team up to track down a rogue vampire.


Chapter Twenty-Nine: Drinking and Driving

Claire emerged from the hotel's revolving door, clutching her coat around her in a sudden chill wind, and nearly bowled Russo over as the other vampire attempted to enter the building.

"Freud!" Claire said, startled.

"Jung." Russo stepped back and nodded a greeting. "I was hoping to find you tonight."

"Yes, well, you've found me. Congratulations. Good bye." Claire moved past the woman into the parking lot.

"No, wait!" Russo jogged to catch up. "I think I might have found one of Dorothy's hidey-holes. I didn't see her, but I definitely saw two of her fledges. I'm going after them tonight and I could use some backup."

"Didn't you dump this in my lap last night? I thought you had better things to do." Claire picked up her pace as much as she could in spiked heels.

"Yeah, well, unlike some people I have a sense of responsibility."

To Claire's consternation, Russo easily kept pace. Claire stopped and turned to face the woman. She had not realized last night how small Russo was. Claire would be inches taller, even without her heels. She turned her collar up and shoved her hands deep in her coat pockets. Her fingers closed on the smooth form of the glass dolphin. After Russo's abrupt appearance and revelation the night before, Claire had thought it better to be safe than sorry where the charm was concerned, and carried it out with her. A steady, cold wind blew in from the northwest, chilling her.

"What was that?" Claire asked. "Was that… did you just try to guilt me?"

"God forbid. Are you coming or not?"

"No. I find I'm in need of some – what did you call it? Sublimation."

"But, the girl. Last night."

Claire raised an eyebrow.

"You didn't kill her."

"Yes, Hobbes, we've had this conversation."

"You saved her from one of them. Look, if someone doesn't take these guys out, they're going to keep killing innocent people. Someone's got to stop them, and tonight I've got a lead."

Claire shook her head and smiled politely. "I don't follow."

"What's not to follow? We're going to save the city, possibly the whole Midwest."

"You said there were six or seven of these vampires, didn't you?"

"Five or six now, but I only saw two tonight."

"Yes, well, I still don't like those odds."

"They're fledglings."

"Fledges."

"Whatever. You took on that guy last night. It's the same odds."

"I was hunting then. We were after the same mark. That changes everything."

Russo frowned and crossed her arms. "But you didn't kill her."

"Well…"

"If you were hunting, why didn't you kill her?"

Realizing she had said too much, Claire backpedaled. "He was hunting in my family's territory and –"

"Uh-uh. You said you were after the same mark." Russo tipped her head and gave Claire a narrow-eyed look. "You picked her out to kill her, but you changed your mind. Why?"

"I did no such thing."

Claire turned and walked briskly toward her car at the far end of the lot. Russo stayed at her elbow, quiet for once and frowning down at her sensible shoes. Claire sped up and nearly ran the last few yards to the car, but her unwanted companion was only a step behind. In her haste to escape, Claire fumbled out her keys and accidentally pushed the button to unlock all the car's doors. Russo took her chance and scrambled into the passenger seat just as Claire sat in the driver's and pushed the "lock" button.

"Oh!" Claire gripped the steering wheel and straightened her arms, pushing her back into the seat. "If you don't get out of my car this instant," she said with a forced calm, "I will drive you into the country and kill you."

Russo crossed her arms and watched Claire in the darkness of the cab, a puzzled crease between her eyebrows.

"What?" Claire asked. "You don't think I'll do it?" She smiled and leaned toward Russo, her hands still on the steering wheel. "Or do you think you think you can take me?"

Russo settled back in her seat, and though she kept the same expression on her face, she seemed to somehow pull into herself and away from Claire.

"Have it your way, Russo."

Claire put the car in gear and backed out of the parking space. Soon she was on a busy street driving north. They would be out of the city within the hour, in sparsely populated countryside, no witnesses, no help. Traffic was stop and go, but Russo made no move to exit the vehicle. Her silence filled the car like smoke, a suffocating presence Claire could not ignore.

"Well, say something," she demanded after several minutes. "Or are you thinking of your final words? You'd better make them good or I simply won't remember them. Final words are no use if no one remembers them. You might as well have said nothing at all." Claire realized she was babbling to fill the silence and stopped. As she no longer breathed habitually, Claire only noticed how the odor of strange vampire had built up in the car when she inhaled to speak. She curled her nose and cracked the window. The sound of rushing air helped ease her tension.

"What's your name?" Russo asked, raising her voice to be heard over the wind.

Claire tilted her head minutely in Russo's direction and raised an eyebrow.

"Yeah," Russo said, "I saw your ID, but I know those are all fake. What's your real name?"

"You're quite young, aren't you?"

"Two years. What of it?"

"A word of advice, Freud. Never tell anyone your age, and immediately attempt to murder any vampire who asks you for it. They are sizing you up." Claire shrugged. "Not that it matters, I suppose, since I shall be murdering you in short order anyway."

"No, you won't."

"I'm afraid the odds are against you. I'm bigger and decades more experienced than you. Also, there is a light grayish cast to your skin that tells me you haven't been eating very well."

"Fair enough, but there's something you're not taking into account."

Claire's eyebrow went up again.

"I'm armed."

"Oh. How disappointing. What with?"

"A .38. And you're not."

"Quite true." Claire nodded once. "We'll call it a draw. Shall I drop you at the next corner?"

"No. We're going to bag us a couple of vampires tonight before they move again."

"Will we. Well, I happen to have one last trick up my sleeve." Claire pressed on the gas and the car leapt forward. Traffic had thinned out, and now the car whizzed past the few other vehicles on the road. "You see, I am considered somewhat reckless even by vampiric standards. It' been the cause of no small amount of grief for my family, I assure you. Observe." The vampire removed her hands from the steering wheel and folded them neatly in her lap.

Russo gave her a sharp glare. "Are you crazy? Take the wheel!"

Claire gave her a serene smile as the car began to drift to the left, out of its lane.

"You've made your point, Radcliff, now take the fucking wheel!" Russo leaned over and saw the speedometer. "Christ!" She grabbed the wheel and jerked them back into their lane. The instant her fingers touched the wheel, Claire's left hand clamped over hers and she drove her right elbow into Russo's nose. Russo cried out and covered the lower part of her face with her free hand.

"I want your gun, Russo," Claire purred. She maintained the car's speed. "If you try to pull your hand free, you'll wreck us. We'll probably survive the crash, but whereas I have family to come to my rescue, you have no one or you would be pestering them."

Russo hesitated, blood leaking out from between her fingers.

"The gun, Russo," Claire repeated. "Slowly, or I push the boundaries of vampire healing for both of us."

Russo snarled, but reached slowly into her jacket to pull the firearm from its shoulder holster. She held it with thumb and forefinger, smearing blood on the butt as she dropped it into Claire's lap as directed. Claire picked up the gun and released Russo's trapped hand. She licked the blood from the butt and let the car slow.

"Thank you, Russo. I think we've learned a valuable lesson tonight: don't press your luck."

Blood dripped down Russo's chin and pat-pattered onto her dark pant leg. She touched the bridge of her nose gingerly.

"Oh, dear," Claire tutted. "Have I broken it?"

Russo glowered at her.

"Oh, don't give me that look. You'll heal. Mostly because I've decided that I want a drink and I've remembered how I hate drinking alone. I'm afraid we'll have to return to Rue Bar. There aren't many places one can get a proper drink around here, and most of them are rather… sticky." She curled her nose delicately.

"So go to the Red Door." Russo's voice was thick. She wiped her face and licked the red from her hand.

"No." The finality of her refusal gathered a sharp look from Russo. Claire continued in a neutral voice, "Anyway, I think I can get us drinks on the house at Rue. What do you say?"

Russo shrugged and settled back in her seat, which was assent enough for Claire to turn the car around at the next light.

ONE HOUR LATER

"So then my sergeant said, 'You're standing in him!' Thank God forensics had finished or I'd have been on a slab next to him."

Claire leaned back and laughed before finishing off her glass of wine.

ONE AND A HALF HOURS LATER

"Not the Matthew Broderick one, surely!"

"Nononono." Russo waved her hand and took another sip of her gin and tonic. "Robert Preston all the way."

"Good. I can't stand the man."

TWO HOURS LATER

"Seriously, Claire, why didn't you kill that woman? Why didn't you kill me?"

"Don't push it; I might yet."

TWO AND A HALF HOURS LATER

"And so he decides that we shouldn't hunt anymore! I understand the need for secrecy, but I don't see why that means we can't hunt." Claire frowned down at her third martini… or was it her fourth? She shook her head. "Well, in principle anyway. I may pass over this person or that person, but that's at my discretion." She slapped the tabletop, and Russo straightened from where she had been leaning on her elbow. "And that's the point! We need a little ultra-violence every once in a while, Sigmund. It's just how we are. They need other people to talk to, to sympathize with them. We need people to fight with."

"But fighting's not killing," Russo pointed out. "There's a big difference."

"No. Dylan and I box sometimes, and that takes the pressure off, but there's nothing quite like taking it to that extreme."

Russo finished her drink and tapped a finger on the table thoughtfully. She jumped when Claire kicked the table leg.

"Oh, now I'm thinking about it," Claire complained.

"I've got something for you to kill."

"Not your vampires again. They've probably moved on. It's been hours."

"Can't hurt to look."

Claire swirled her martini around its glass and, with a shrug, knocked back the rest of it. "S'pose not," she agreed and lurched to her feet. Russo gave her an assessing look.

"Actually, Claire, maybe we should wait 'til tomorrow," Russo suggested.

"Oh, no. Don't worry. I'm fine." Claire made a grab for her purse, missed, and tried again. "I used to live quite the adventurous life before Dylan and I settled down and adopted – er, a puppy." Claire winced. "I've kicked more ass pissed than you've sat on sober. Let's go."

Claire stood and wound her way through the tables, stumbling only once. Russo followed a few steps behind. At the exit, Claire twisted her head around to peer at her companion.

"Why the dour face? You got what you wa—oh!"

While speaking to Russo, Claire had forgotten to watch where she was going and plowed straight into a woman on her way in. The woman dropped her water bottle and its contents splashed all over Claire's feet. The vampire held her hair out of her face as she bent to inspect the damage. She wiggled one foot, sending water droplets onto the pavement. The wet made her feet cold in a distant way, as if that last martini intercepted the signal before it reached her brain.

"I'm so sorry!" The woman began. "I didn't see – Claire?"

The vampire straightened and her raised her eyebrows in surprise. "Sarah? What are you doing all the way out here?"

Sarah Monahan took a step back to let a couple of patrons past her and into the bar.

"I was looking for you, actually," she said. "I thought – I think we need to talk."

"About what?" Claire, too, stepped away from the door and onto the sidewalk. "How did you know to find me here?"

"Um…" Sarah's brow beetled and her eyes slid past Claire for a moment, unfocusing as they did.

"Ehm… Sarah?"

"She high or something?" Russo murmured behind her.

"Sarah? I don't think she knows what the word means. Listen, Sarah." The woman's eyes focused again on Claire. "We're going to have to talk another time, I'm afraid. I've got an errand to run."

"Oh." Sarah's eyes suddenly snapped wide open and she took a step back. "Oh! Nick told me about you and Dylan. He told me what you are."

Russo took a closer look at Sarah. "Who's Nick?" she asked.

"Never mind," Claire said, cutting her off. "Sarah? A word to the wise. The next time Nick tells you that you are acquainted with dangerous people, it's probably best not to seek them out at night, alone. I'm sorry I couldn't tell you myself, but it's not as if you would have believed me anyway. Now, I think it's best for all involved if you just hurried along home where you'll be safe." She shot Russo a warning glare. The blonde responded with an innocent shrug.

Before Sarah could respond, Claire took Russo by the arm and started down the street toward her car, half dragging the other vampire with her. Though she knew she was being unforgivably rude to poor Sarah, the pleasant alcohol buzz in her head got in the way of any more subtle means of separating the human from Russo. The blonde might be pleasant enough company for a vampire, but she was still a vampire, and therefore could not be trusted to play nice with the humans, especially when the human in question as much as openly admitted that she knew their secret.

Luckily, Sarah did not pursue them, only stood on the sidewalk with a dazed expression as they walked away. Claire only released Russo's arm when she reached the car and they had to separate to get in.

"What was that about?" Russo asked when they were settled in their seats.

"None of your business, I'm afraid." Claire started to back out, almost clipped the car parked on their right, and tried again.

"Hey, you think you should be driving?"

Claire snorted. "You've seen me drive sober. How much worse can I possibly be? Now, where to?"

"I think we should do this another night."

"You were the one in such a hurry."

"Yeah, that was three hours ago."

"Well, you've got help now. You might not have it tomorrow."

"This isn't exactly how I imagined it."

"That's life for you." Claire sighed. "You get a husband, a house, a – puppy." She glanced at Russo out of the corner of her eye and the other vampire raised an eyebrow. "And you try to make this life, but damn it all, it's so boring. It's nothing at all how you envisioned it."

"It's suburbia. I think they did that on purpose."

Claire ignored her and ran a red light amidst a chorus of protesting car horns. "Don't get me wrong. I love my husband, and I love my… puppy. But that doesn't exactly fill the hours, you know. I thought maybe a little hunting, a little time spent with someone a little less, well, safe would help. You know, get the blood flowing." She grinned. "But then Barbara shows up in the middle of it all, and I knew her. I can't just kill someone I know simply because I was hungry. How terribly rude."

"And the bartender the other night?"

"Well. She seemed like such a nice girl. Oh." Claire abruptly banged her forehead down on the steering wheel. "This is a disaster. I'm bored stiff and surrounded by harpies at home, but I can't bear to hunt."

"Claire! The road, dammit! Eyes on the road!"

Claire sat up and steered calmly out of oncoming traffic back into the right lane. More horns blared.

"What else is there?" Claire asked miserably. "Is this it? Is this the rest of my life? Trapped in suburban hell?"

Russo sat stiffly in her seat, one hand gripping the shoulder strap of the seat belt.

"Claire," she ground out through clenched teeth. "Would you mind not having your existential crisis in the middle of traffic?"

"Well where else should I have it?"

"The bar seemed ideal. Anyway, you missed the turn."

"Oh. I'll just U-turn, then." Claire prepared to whip the car across four lanes of traffic.

"No! Pull over. I will drive us there. Any minute now five black-and-whites are going to appear on the horizon, lights flashing."

"Oh, alright." She squinted. "I'm not quite sure where we are, anyway. I don't remember any eight-lane highways in Franklin." Claire switched lanes without looking and cut off a pick-up. Tires squealed as she whipped into a gas station, leaving black marks on the pavement behind her.

A minute later, Russo merged safely into traffic. She even used the turn signal.