It took only a few brief moments to explain to Vincent what became of Dean (leaving out the details of the story showing the changeling of her dual nature and the fact that her partner was an animated inanimate object) but he didn't look satisfied.
"What business do you have in a bar?" he looked at her cautiously. Some were truly above the petty laws of men, but not by choice. Some ran on circumstances' dark deep forest roads. His crimson eyes bored into her darkening amber brown ones like wood burrowing insects. "You don't look of age."
"Well," she flushed a red that rivaled the hue of his eyes. Her business face faltered under that stare, a stare that could melt young girls hearts. Or burn them if need be. Could she honestly lie to this man? A man which she followed through the news not so long ago, a man that challenged a veritable God himself. A man who she had been sent inadvertently after. "We're talking about Midgar here. There are prostitutes there half my age." She did not enjoy speaking at all under that icy unblinking gaze, let alone lying. She averted her eyes down to the floor where they found an interesting stone to look at. Pain irrupted inside her skull as the fog shrouded blaze forced its way inside her thoughts from its perch in Vincent's stab wound.
Don't be stupid! He knows now, I won't hide myself forever. Gods! I thought you knew me. If you did, you'd know I hate hiding! Now stop acting your age and act like the adult you soon will be! The stone screeched in her head as Vincent watched her grimace, fully unaware that the pain she felt was transmitted from a source on his person. Like a parasite, it wormed through her mind destroying all thoughts it touched, eating away at all the memories in her head. Any more and she would be empty.
Fine you sad excuse for a fossilized shit, she yelled back with her thoughts, beating back the barrage of snaking tendrils of its thoughts as it consumed hers. I'll tell him. The pain rolled off her mind in waves and she breathed shaking, trying to remember who she was. Breath came to her easier as the last tendrils left her ruined mind.
"I am Aulia." she spoke pulling in shaking breaths that continually settled and slightly repaired her battered mind. "The one I work for doesn't matter now, but I am a Gatherer. I am paid to find oddities." She grimaced again as the stone mentally slapped her.
"Such as? What was your last gathering?" Vincent spoke quietly holding her gaze again in his cold red stare.
"My employer sent me to fetch something, she is a truly strange one herself, I guess you have to be in this profession." Aulia shrugged again as the stone struck her mind to mind.
I didn't tell you to say that much! It howled in her head like a rabid beast.
"What did you bring her?" he spoke again watching for the traces of lies.
"The head of a man in high esteem of the populace." the grin that brought to mind the face of a wolf returned to her face. He didn't look too surprised.
"You're a Death Gatherer then?" he spoke almost to the air itself, as if she wasn't there. The stone struck relentlessly at her unguarded mind.
"That, that is my partner." she gestured towards his chest, and for the first time, he noticed how his ribs rattled brokenly beneath a gray white stone entombed in a tiny rain cloud. He touched his slowly rotting fingers to the stones' smooth and shining surface only to bring them away with blood flowing through them alive and well for an instant.
"Who was this?" he breathed watching his hand die again. The stone let out a pulse of energy in its moment of connecting again into the living world that brought Vincent's body close to full life. He gasped in anguish as the nerves in his broken chest cried out. He staggered backwards, grabbing at his shattered breast bone, almost like he could repair those bones. Aulia moved to his side and braced the slightly taller man against her strong shoulder while he died again.
"Another sin," he gasped. "Let me be dead." She stared into his pain wracked face and felt a sudden loathing towards her employer and that sick bitch's needs. His breathing slowly eased away into nothing and she dared another look into his face. His red eyes locked on her brown ones and he shook her grasp from his shoulders to lean heavily on his coffin.
"You didn't answer." he said staring into her eyes like he wanted to pierce her very thoughts.
"What?" she spoke trying in vain to avoid that one question.
"Who was this? Or won't you tell me?"
She sighed. "He was" but broke off at the sound of someone moving slowly down the dungeon stairs. She stared into the darkness beyond the open door to the hallway, the sound of feet moving toward them over stone. A click tore her eyes from the door. She turned to Vincent, gun in hand, he stood staring out the door.
"Draw your weapons." he advised in a low whisper. The stone lay hidden among his clothes, he looked fully alive.
"I don't have any." her face lightened in a cocky smirk. He shrugged listening to the muffled voices echoing down the hall. "I don't need any. Maybe you should play dead?" He stared at her, his eyes almost displayed disgust at her comment.
"No." he whispered.
"Fine." she grumbled, her fingers changing and elongating as they would when she'd need her wings, her nails becoming pearly talons. She remained a human while her hands danced along the boundaries of normal hands and claws of a beast. She stood, five foot eleven inches near the six foot Vincent, side by side with the dead man. His eyes found her raised hands and brandished claws.
There was another like him, yet they were never similar. She caught his gaze.
"These," she raised her hands a little higher above her chest. "another story for another time." He nodded. Bits of conversation drifted to their ears from the new comers.
"Sorry to tell you, Sir Drake." they heard a woman say. "We've found what's become of Dean."
And the footsteps drew all the nearer.
-There, she has a name. After much pestering from Gene, Aulia has her name. I'm still open for questions. Told ya' the story would begin to make sense.
-Jade Rowwood