Notes: Lyrics from Bon Jovi "100 Years"
Feedback: Good or bad, 's all groovy :)

I'll be standing here
For the next 100 years
If it all should end tonight
I'll know it was worth the fight
And we'll be standing here
For the next 100 years

Woodman's head snapped up as he heard the lockdown begin, a second later he started cursing under his breath. They'd been watching him and, in his anger, he hadn't even considered it. Goodbye career, hello officer. At least he could make it worth it.

The vampire at his feet stared up at him; blissfully quiet, only the guarded eyes tracking his movements as he paced around the room. He would have liked to have put it down to his fearsome presence, but had to concede the broken off chair leg he'd rammed into its chest was probably the source of its silence.

He was considering his next move. The door was solid; he could put the thing through a lot of pain before they got in. Something at the back of his mind, the rational spot in the sudden release of anger, told him this was wrong. But, somehow, he just couldn't bring himself to care. Then that whisper of a voice came over the speakers and he knew a court-martial was the least of his worries.

Isaac felt the security doors slam down through the vibrations of the concrete floor. She was causing some havoc. The sound of her voice flooding the pit, even if only by electrical means, would have bought a smile to his lips. Except for one small detail. One pointy wooden detail, lodged between his third and fifth ribs if he had to guess; it ached like hell.. Now all he had to do was hope his girl got there before the stoned looking man above him snapped out of it.

A sense of sudden balance filled Woodman's mind as the emergency lights came on, he could feel the numbness creeping over the anger and the healthy dose of fear at the situation he was in. He crossed back to the vampire and crouched at its side, looking at it with a clinical detachment as higher thought process gave way to a dreamy surrealism. He smiled and was rewarded with the first flinch of fear in the creature's eyes.

"I want to tell you about a girl. I knew I loved her from the moment I laid eyes on her. She was dancing with the best man at a friends wedding. I just had to cut in ... she was beautiful you see. So full of life. I had to know her, touch her, hear her voice. Her name was Sara. We were married the next spring. It rained, but she just laughed and said ... she said it could never rain where we were. It rained the day I buried her too"

The tone of voice was giving him the creeps, and he didn't creep easy. He was Sabbat for pity's sake, but this was the exact tone of voice he'd heard from the Priests, just before they'd broken his bones and declared him pariah. Uncaring and distracted, as if he were just a curious and annoying little insect to be forgotten or perhaps toyed with a while. But thirty years as a vampire had it's uses, and he met the human's eyes stonily, affecting boredom. And that empty smile on the well worn features came again.

"It was my fault, I was working late. Too into my work, but she never complained. Every missed dinner, every forgotten anniversary, she understood. Said I was doing something important and she supported that. One in a million my girl. She didn't die easy; there was skin under her nails and blood on her teeth. But you still killed her."

Woodman paused a moment, surveying the thing that was staring at him as if transfixed. Absently he wondered what he must look like to it. Not a young man, nowhere near the prime of his life. Greying at the temples, far too thin, a ragged and unshaven madman. Not an awe-inspiring sight, and yet it was watching him as if he were a cobra ready to strike. He gave a thin smile and continued.

"Well, perhaps not you. Although I suppose it might have been. Was it you? Hmmm?"

In one smooth motion, with that same lack of thought he'd given most his actions so far, he jerked the chair leg from the vampire's chest. He was on a roll of bad decisions, why stop now? Before it could twitch he had the thing by it's grimy collar, hauling it to it's feet and shaking it with a force he barely knew he possessed. But his words were a rattlesnake's hiss.

"Was it you?"

Isaac was almost relieved to be saved from answering the crazy man with the apparent death wish by the round of gunfire that came to life outside the door. With a morbid foreboding he suspected he would be re-evaluating his priorities later, but bullets flying had never sounded so good. He began to unobtrusively unpick the fingers clutching his shirt collar, hoping the agent's attention would remain riveted to the door long enough for him to put the bite on.

There was shouting outside, running feet pounding and a scream that became a death cry, and then silence descended once more. Woodman thought he'd recognised at least one of the voices, a face swam in his mind, but he couldn't give it a name. A cocky young man, always volunteering for missions he had no training for, just to get in on a kill. He had no business being in that corridor, he was just a stupid kid. Then he became aware of something picking at his nerveless fingers and swung his head back around to look at the vampire frantically trying to free itself.

A moment's pause and Isaac evaluated his options. He had barely enough blood to be mobile, let alone bolster his strength with, fuelling the few disciplines he had bothered to learn was right out. His earlier threats to come visit had been basic bluster, he hadn't actually expected to moron to take him up on it. So he gave what he hoped was a charming smile and tried his last defence, talking.

"Look, she's after me. Now, let's face it, if she finds me - and she will find me - all dead she'll go spare. We're talking extreme language, violence, little bits of you and your friends decorating the building in itty bitty pieces. And it won't be quick, 'cause it sounds like she bought friends."

Woodman frowned and bought the chair leg back up.

"Ok! Getting to the quick of it! You keep the wood out of my heart and get me out of this cell. We go find the girl, touching reunion, me and her go on our way with minimal death." After a beat and the narrowing of Woodman's eyes he hurriedly went on. "No death in fact. Not even a light snack in intermission. We'll go be missionaries or something ... saving the whales in third world countries"

He hated to hear the slightly pleading whine in his tone, but he couldn't help it. He wanted to live. He'd wanted to live as soon as he'd heard her voice and there wasn't a thing he could think of he wouldn't do to get to her. Even beg.

"It wasn't us. That killed your girl I mean. Priests in the Vatican? Sure. But a housewife ... there's no challenge there. She likes a challenge." Now his patience for the blank look he was getting was starting to wear thin "Or, alternatively, you can finish me off and wait in here while she kills everyone. It's got an appeal, have to say. You could at least keep me alive for a bit, I do like to hear her work. And the longer you keep us in here, the more time she's got to play. Your choice man".

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TBC if worth it