Chapter 2
When Avian opened her apartment, a small black ball came hurling at the group, and Avian caught this ball in her arms.
"Poor Leahann, she's been drinking too much coffee again." Avian said to the three stunned boys, who were staring at the small person struggling to get free of Avian's playful chokehold. Avian then let go of her roommate, grinning at her, and introduced her to the men.
"Hey, Leahann, this is Irvine, Sephiroth, and Vincent. Guys, this is Leahann, my roommate."
"Sadly enough." Gabrielle interjected. The guys acknowledged Leahann, and she nodded to them, then stepped back and made way for everyone to get inside, and punched Gabrielle playfully as she came in. Gabrielle meanwhile, not in the best of moods, tossed Leahann out the door, locking it behind her. Muffled shouts of,
"Let me in!" and profanities too rude to mention were heard from the other side of the door. Avian called to Gabrielle,
"Let her in Gabrielle." In an exasperated tone, as though this happened everyday. Gabrielle let Leahann in, and then stuck her tongue out at Gabrielle. Avian rolled her eyes and stopped Irvine, Sephiroth, and Vincent before they came any farther into the room, asking them to take off their shoes. They obliged while Avian took their coats to the closet. Gabrielle and Leahann, meanwhile, had gone into the kitchen and taken out some drinks and tortilla chips for everyone. They all plopped down in the tiny living room, Irvine pointedly taking the seat beside Avian, and Gabrielle sitting on a couch with Sephiroth, while Leahann and Vincent sat in the two other chairs. They were just about to start all the explaining when there was an impossibly loud banging from the front door. Irvine raised his eyebrows at the male voice that was yelling, which sounded quite drunk also. Leahann went to the door and listened for a moment, then told Avian,
"It's Joey. He's drunk, the stupid ass." She opened the door a crack, and when Joey tried to force his way in, she kicked him with surprising momentum in the shin causing him to say stupidly,
"Heyyyy…now tha' hurtshhh…" along with some other profanities. Gabrielle shot out of the living room, running to her room, shouting along the way,
"For the love of all that is evil and twisted! Don't let him in!" She reappeared a moment later dressed in riot control armor.
"Okay, I'm ready now." An awkward silence ensued, and Avian looked from Gabrielle to Irvine. Irvine was turning red in the face from the effort of not laughing.
"Don't you dare laugh," Avian cautioned, "You remember what happened last time she was embarrassed. I don't want my apartment ruined." Irvine immediately turned pale and nodded. Leahann let Joey in, and he had been leaning on the door, so he fell right into the door. Gabrielle tensed, getting ready to attack Joey as soon as Leahann got out of the way. While all this was going on, Avian was explaining to Irvine and Sephiroth what they were doing. Vincent had gotten to his feet in case Gabrielle lost control.
"You see, every so often one of our friends will get rather drunk, so sometimes they appear at our doorstep. It's Gabrielle's job to knock them out, then Leahann and I drag them to the kitchen to sleep it off."
"Well why to you let them in!" asked Irvine.
"Because we don't want them getting run over or something."
Gabrielle snorted. "Dammit."
"Yeah, Gabrielle wishes we could just let certain ones get run over. I prefer not to, so we just deal." Irvine's eyes widened a little at the idea of these girls handling this on a regular basis, but hey, that's life, I guess…
"This time, it's Leahann's boyfriend. Gabrielle thinks he's a stupid ass, and is going to knock him out anyway, or he might puke all over the carpet. That's her excuse anyway." Then Irvine, Sephiroth, and Avian got up to observe the proceedings better. Leahann was keeping Joey busy fending her off, while Gabrielle and Vincent approached from behind Joey. Then Gabrielle smacked Joey over the head, drawing his attention to her. The she touched his forehead while he was trying to make his eyes focus, and he slumped to the floor with a loud echoing thud.
Gabrielle said, "Well, I always knew his head was empty, that just confirms it." She then walked off to her room, stepping on Joey unceremoniously. Avian grinned at the slight frown Leahann gave Gabrielle, then went to help Leahann move Joey to his usual spot under the table.
"Actually," said Gabrielle, "We should put him in one of the rooms if we're going to do our explanations of our…erm…conditions and such." Avian and Leahann grabbed Joey's arms and legs, but Irvine and Sephiroth stopped them, and lugged Joey into Leahann's room, and dropped him on the mattress, making his head collide with LeahAnn's guitar. The guitar then collided with the wall causing random objects to fall from a shelf above Leahann's bed and hit Joey in the head. Joey moaned drunkenly as the objects struck him.
Avian glared at Gabrielle and said "Gabrielle! Why'd you do that!"
Gabrielle tried to look as innocent as she could in a black leather outfit and replied "Do what?"
Avian sighed and led them out of Leahann's room. Vincent stood in the hallway waiting for Gabrielle. When she finally appeared he pulled her aside.
"Did you cause that chain-reaction back there?" Vincent demanded.
"What do you think? I do stuff like that to Joey all the time, Avian knows I do. Once I gave him an atomic wedgie from the next building, of course I had Leahann record the whole thing. Joey's reaction was priceless!" Gabrielle chuckled, while Vincent looked subtly mortified. Gabrielle walked down the hallway "What, you mean you don't play jokes on your friends?" Gabrielle asked somewhat shocked by Vincent's stern "No"
"Whatever, I guess I just have more of a sense of humor than you, meh." Gabrielle shrugged her shoulders and sat down on the couch next to Sephiroth. Avian was seated next to Irvine, so Vincent, feeling left out took a seat in the recliner. Then they began to talk, occasionally sipping their wine. Vincent explained that his mother had volunteered for some experimental work, and didn't know she was pregnant until it was too late, and had him, a seemingly normal baby boy. She died in a reactor explosion shortly after, while he was safe at daycare. Gabrielle explained that her mom was drinking a very strong alcohol that had been tampered with due to a man who was going to date rape her. He was also an experimental escapee.
Sephiroth screamed, "DAMN YOU HOJO, YOU ARE THE CAUSE OF ALL THESE PROBLEMS!"
Gabrielle said, "Calm down Sephiroth, what's your story?"
"May I suggest anger management?" Leahann interrupted.
"Shut up Leahann." Gabrielle snapped.
"Make me!" Leahann shouted jumping off the chair and running down the hall.
"Good riddance to bad rubbish, now Sephiroth, continue." Gabrielle stared into his deep green eyes, the flecks of silver in them danced in lazy swirling circles.
Sephiroth stood up and took off his coat, revealing a tattooed number on his left arm. Staring at his naked, finely chiseled chest, Gabrielle suddenly blushed, everyone in the room could tell what she was thinking. Ignoring Gabrielle's red face and obvious thoughts, Sephiroth began to speak;
"I was the artificial product of an Ancient's DNA and a human embryo, Hojo was the head scientist on the project, I grew up in a laboratory. I heard rumors of other escaped experiments like my self, so you see Gabrielle and Vincent, Hojo is the reason we're the way we are."
"well at least now I know who's responsible! I'll make him pay!" Gabrielle jumped up, Seprioth attempted to pull her back down but she slipped out of his grasp, her black leather grew tighter as her muscles got tense, ready for a fight.
"There's only one problem Gabrielle, Hojo's dead." Sephiroth mumbled shaking his head.
"How?" Gabrielle demanded.
"I killed him when I escaped." Seprioth twisted his hands nervously, he couldn't look at Gabrielle, the anger in her eyes reminded him too much of himself.
"I hope you made him suffer." Gabrielle spat. Sephiroth was once again reminded strongly of himself, unabashed anger and hate just below the surface ready to strike at anyone. He shook his head, that wasn't him any more, he had learned that hate and anger only ate at you inside until you were cold and hollow.
"Okay, that's enough spite for one evening," Avian interrupted. "Let's watch our favorite movie!" Avian put Queen of the Damned into the DVD player.
As the movie began to play, Gabrielle yawned and snuggled down into a soft spot on the couch. She had seen this movie so many times that it didn't matter if she fell asleep, besides there was something much more interesting to watch right next to her. Sephiroth eyed Irvine, making sure his "Ladies' man" friend didn't do anything stupid. Sephiroth, after watching Avian easily evade Irvine's attempts, settled back to watch the movie. Lestat had just met Marius and was becoming a vampire, when Avian felt herself falling asleep, forgetting that Irvine was on the couch also, nestled into the crook of his arm. She thought that it was the couch arm, but after it reached over her and held her, she thought Shit…that sure as hell isn't the damn couch…then she thought oh, just screw it…hmmm…this is actually really comfy…
Gabrielle was looking at Sephiroth, and when he caught her staring, she turned away, blushing. When she turned back, he was still staring at her with his piercing green eyes, and it was his turn to blush. She admired the way the crimson color rose slowly up his neck, to his face, oh how she wanted to just hold his face in her gaze forever…wait a second, what am I thinking! I have been spending too much time reading love stories on She glanced at Avian, who was curled up in Irvine's arms. Sheesh, Avian doesn't waste any time…Gabrielle thought that Avian really did like Irvine, even though she acted annoyed with him. Gabrielle poked into Avian's mind for a moment, and could hear Avian thinking, "hmmmm…this is actually really comfy" and watched as Avian leaned farther into Irvine's chest, and soon she was asleep. Gabrielle decided to see if Sephiroth or even Vincent was thinking what she was thinking… She heard Vincent thinking, "Irvine had better not do anything stupid… Gabrielle'd whip his ass. Not to mention Seprioth, who's taken it upon himself to protect every girl involved with Irvine…"
Then Gabrielle heard Sephiroth thinking, "I wonder if Gabrielle would care if I just put my arm on the back of the couch…oh Ra, and I just want to hold her…"
Gabrielle quickly responded, and leaned into Seprioth, causing his eyes to widen his eyes at the beautiful girl in his lap, and she whispered, "I'm definitely thinking what you're thinking."
He smirked to himself and turned to face the movie, repeatedly looking at Gabrielle in the moonlight coming in from the window.
Irvine ran his fingers through Avian's gorgeous fiery hair, admiring the soft glow of it in the light of the full moon. She opened her eyes, looking as though she was going to smack Irvine for a moment, then smiled at him, her green eyes shining, and snuggled back in. In a few minutes, Avian's slow breathing told Irvine that she was asleep. He readjusted her so that she was propped up against his chest and between his legs, making for a more comfortable sleeping position for the both of them. He glanced at Sephiroth before he too drifted off because of Avian's warmth.
Sephiroth and Gabrielle were both sleeping, her lying with her head on his chest, and he had his arms around her, protectively. They were dreaming of each other, Vincent suspected, unless they only had their eyes closed, or unless they weren't dreaming. Leahann had gone to her room to be with Joey, even if he was a dumbass, and Vincent turned off the movie, and looked around at the resting couples, his eyes lingering for a moment on the sleeping Gabrielle. A dejected look crossed his face as he saw the faint smile on Gabrielle and Sephiroth's face. Then he walked away to Gabrielle's room, which Leahann had suggested he use. He fell over on her bed, falling asleep almost instantly, overcome by Gabrielle's scent filling his nose and thoughts of holding her close…