Disclaimer: I own most of the characters.
CHAPTER 8-A DECISION IS MADE
Gina curled up into a ball in the corner of her bedroom in her apartment. She had numbly hurried through a shower and changed clothes before locking herself in her room and drawing her knees up under her chin, trying her hardest to keep from crying in front of the others. Maria had knocked on her door and called out her name a couple of times but after the events at the club she was in need of some time to take it all in. Katy had flown through the shower and then planted herself outside of Gina's room, wanting to be there for her cousin when she was ready to talk. Katy had been surprised upon the discovery that Gina was also a slayer, but a comment from Paul about it being possible that it could run in families had eased the burden somewhat. While Katy waited on Gina Diane and Shandra counted the money that they had hurriedly collected from the club while Maria scowled at them from the kitchen table as she kept watch on a small television that was on the counter, looking for any word on the club fire.
"How is she," Paul asked softly with a concerned look on his face as he knelt down next to Katy, who was lying on her back on the floor up against the wall with her legs flat against the wall towards the ceiling.
"I don't know, she won't talk to me, I still can't believe that she's a slayer to, this is all to much," Katy replied with a sad and worried look on her face as she casually pulled the bottom of her shirt down to cover the bit of her stomach that was showing.
"She's scared Katy, can you blame her, in one night she bumps into her favorite cousin, finds out she's a slayer, and then sees something that'll probably give all of us nightmares for years, hell…we should be glad that she's not catatonic," Paul replied softly with a sympathetic look on his face before he laid down on the floor in the same position as Katy, leaving the two elbow to elbow.
"You're right I guess, but it's just that this is all so sudden, we're both slayers but…no one came for us, no one came to help us understand what was going on, sure I was lucky and the crazy dreams were pretty light, but Gina could have been terrified by them, at least I know what being a slayer is all about, but she," Katy replied with a sad and worried look on her face as she turned her head to the side and looked straight over into Paul's eyes.
"Have you tried to tell her about what being a slayer is all about, who knows maybe that'll calm her down, if it doesn't at least she'll know that she's not going crazy and that she's not alone," Paul offered with a hopeful look on his face as he lightly nudged Katy with his elbow.
"No good, she won't talk back, I can tell that she's been crying but unless I want to break the door down and charge in there I'm just going to have to wait until she's ready to come out," Katy said back with a nervous and scared look on her face as she slid over a bit and positioned herself a little bit closer to Paul.
"Maybe you should get some sleep, you've been up a long time, I can stay here and keep watch if you want me to," Paul wondered aloud with a concerned look on his face as he reached up and gently began to rub his thumb softly up and down a short distance of Katy's shoulder, earning an appreciative smile.
"You don't have to do that, she's not going to go…anywhere," Katy started to reply with a grateful smile on her face before her eyelids grew heavy and she fell asleep with her head resting on Paul's shoulder.
"Good night Katy," Paul whispered back softly with a slightly cheesy grin on his face before he turned his head back to look straight up at the ceiling before falling asleep himself.
1111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111
"So now we have three slayers," Shandra asked with a confused look on her face as she sat in Gina's living room and looked through the newspaper.
"Looks that way, Gina seems to be a slayer to, guess it couldn't hurt to have all the help that we can get," Maria replied with a slightly uneasy look on her face as she looked up and back from trying to tune the radio in Gina's kitchen to the right station.
"So then are we thinking that Stacy and Anastasia are working together…or did we just pick the wrong damn club to start out with," Shandra asked with a confused and curious look on her face as she walked into the kitchen and sat down at the table.
"I don't think that they're working together, with our rotten luck we just picked another winner of a club, at least most of the dancers got out alive and we helped Gina and Katy reconnect," Maria replied softly with a nervous shrug of her shoulders as she finally gave up trying to find the right station and just shut the radio off.
"So are we going to take Gina with us now, she can't exactly go back to work tomorrow night like always, because of us she's out of a job," Diane said with a guilty half smile on her face as she sat down in a chair next to Shandra and then ran her hands nervously through her hair.
"I guess we'll have to, she's a slayer, she's a part of a bigger world now, she needs…no deserves to know who and what she is and that she's not crazy and that everything's going to be okay," Maria answered with a slightly uncertain look on her face as she mentally did her best to sound brave and confidant so that the others didn't lose hope or get scared.
"Only everything's not going to be okay is it, even with the knowledge that she's a slayer that's not going to bring her friends back or make her life easier, if anything its only going to make things worse, you saw that for yourself in Europe," Katy said with a very serious tone to her voice and look on her face as she walked slowly into the room, looking first at Maria and then at Diane and Shandra.
"But she seems to be okay, her life seemed fine before we showed up, maybe if we just leave her here," Diane said with a nervous and hesitant smile on her face as she hunched up her shoulders a bit and looked back and forth between Katy and Maria.
"If you call then crying herself silly while locked in her room as okay then yeah, that just might work," Maria replied with a sarcastic frown on her face as she finally gave up trying to find a good radio station on Gina's radio and growled softly as she just unplugged it.
"So then that leaves us with only one option, when we leave here we take her with us, I doubt that we'll have much trouble convincing her to leave," Paul added with a serious look on his face as he stood next to Katy and gave her a supportive look.
"Where…where would I go, no matter where I go her face will always haunt my thoughts and dreams, my life is over," Gina mumbled softly with a thoroughly defeated expression on her face as she walked upright, but slid against the wall, into the room. She had almost stepped out of her room in the same bloody clothes that she had worn before leaving the club. But she had forced herself to change clothes, leaving the old ones in a bloody heap on the floor.
"No, it is not over Gina, I won't let it be over," Katy exclaimed with a very angry and upset scowl on her face as she ran up to her cousin and grabbed her arms by the shoulders, making her keep her head up.
"How, you can't take the memory away, how Katarina," Gina begged softly with a defeated look on her face as the tears began to flow before Katy pulled her into a tight hug as the others looked on with sad frowns on their faces.
"You're right she can't, no one can, but memories are what make us who we are, our experiences shape the way that we lead our lives, some are good and some aren't, in the end we just have to live with them all," Paul said softly with a very grim expression on his face as he walked up to the two women and slid his hands into his pockets, hoping that neither would cry.
"Easy for you to say, you didn't just see your best friend…like that," Gina started to snap back with an angry scowl on her face before the memory came back and she became overcome with emotion and turned away.
"You're right we didn't, but you can't keep it bottled up inside of you, it's not healthy, if you do it'll eat away at you until you're nothing but a shell of your former self," Katy replied softly with a very worried and concerned look on her face as she pulled Gina into a comforting hug.
"What is this, an intervention," Gina grumbled back with an unhappy and sad pout on her face as her shoulders slumped forward and she pulled away from Katy before pulling the refrigerator open.
"What…no, of course not," Diane exclaimed with a surprised and confused look on her face as she looked to Shandra for support.
" Are you going to continue to dance," Shandra asked finally with a nervous look on her face as she looked away from Diane and towards Gina.
"What, how can you ask her that after," Maria started to exclaim with a shocked and angry frown on her face as she spun around on Shandra before Paul cut in.
"I think what Shandra means is that if Gina doesn't feel like she can just get a job with another of the clubs in town then she's better off coming with us, right," Paul interjected with a nervous and worried look on his face as he stepped in between Maria and Shandra.
"Yeah, I couldn't stay here if I were you, to many memories," Shandra replied with a somber pout on her face as she hung her head a bit and lightly scratched at the top of the table with her fingernails.
"Way to many memories," Diane chimed in with a sad and unhappy frown on her face as she shook her head and leaned up against Shandra.
"But I can't just drop everything and leave," Gina started to say with a frustrated and overwhelmed look on her face before Maria interjected as she poked her head back into the room from the living room.
"You may have to, come take a look at this," Maria interjected with a very serious and grim scowl on her face as she lead the others back into the living room before she picked up the remote and turned the volume up.
"What the…oh my God," Gina started to ask with a confused look on her face before she saw her face being flashed up on the screen and several people calling her a murderer, someone that must be caught at all costs because of the brutality of the crimes committed. "N…no, this isn't happening, tell me this is not happening Katy, please," Gina begged softly with a pleading look one her face and tone to her voice before she buried her face into the crook of Katy's neck and let the tears flow.
"I'll get the bus started," Paul said with a grim frown on his face before he walked up and shut the television off.
111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111
"Where are we going," Diane asked with a worried look on her face as she sat down in the seat behind Paul. They had collected Gina and her things and hit the road just under an hour after the alert was broadcast. The police would show up less than fifteen minutes later to find the place deserted.
"Beats me, other than getting as far away from the big easy as we can possibly get on this tank of gas I'm open to suggestions from the peanut gallery," Paul said back with a tired sigh as she shrugged his shoulders and briefly looked up into the mirror to check on Katy and Gina.
"Let's head west, I've always wanted to see LA," Diane said with an excited grin on her face as she popped up over the top of the seats momentarily before Shandra pulled her back down with an arm around her waist.
"It's nothing special, it's a lot like Florida, only almost everything's fake, the tans the boobs the…," Katy grumbled back with a bored sigh and shrug of her shoulders as she looked away from Gina for a moment.
"I think we get the picture…though LA could be the place, at least we'd have someone that'd know the area, we wouldn't have to wander around like refugees, hitting every strip club in town," Maria interrupted softly with an annoyed frown on her face as she sat at the desk with her laptop open and replying to emails.
"It doesn't matter how many clubs we hit unless we can stop Anastasia, she's the one behind all of this, we stop her and everybody goes home," Katy announced with a determined look on her face as she leaned back up against one of the seats and stared up towards the front of the bus and Paul.
"Fine, then we find her and stake her ass, problem solved, we all go home," Shandra stated with a confident tone to her voice as she sat up straight and look out over the top of the seats over to Maria.
"If only it were that simple, even if we nail Anastasia there's still Stacy and Chucky to worry about," Maria replied with a tired and worn out expression on her face as she turned and looked first to Gina and then to Katy, not noticing Diane and Shandra giggling along the side.
"Stacy's small potatoes, just a little guppy in a larger pond, with any lucky she'll piss somebody off and they'll stake her for us, it's Chucky and Anastasia that we have to worry about, Anastasia won't stop till…well I think we all know when she'll stop, and Chucky won't stop till we're either all dead, or part of his vampire biker gang," Katy interjected with a solemn expression on her face as she gave Gina a good hard squeeze in a hug and then used the seats to pull herself up to her feet.
"So what do we do, lay a trap and hope that they take the bait," Shandra asked with a concerned look on her face as she calmly played with the ends of Diane's bangs.
"I wish, no they're to smart for that, well they are unless we use something really super good for bait, then they might come, then comes the problem of how do we kill them without getting ourselves killed in the process," Maria replied with a tired look on her face as she reached up and rubbed her tired eyes while searching for an idea on her laptop.
"Well we all know what…or should I say who Anastasia wants, what if we use you as bait Katy, get you into another club that she's been known to frequent and then somehow get Chucky there to, then torch the place," Paul interjected with a helpful smile on his face as he looked up into the rearview mirror about the windshield and winked at Katy, who at first looked angry but then couldn't help but smile back at the end.
"Uh one small problem there Paul, you're forgetting Chucky's gang of motorcycling vampires, they want Katy and I dead, if they find out that Katy by herself is going to be dancing somewhere then they'll probably surround the place and make sure that no one walks out of there alive, if they'd even come at all," Maria replied with a somber expression of concern on her face as she looked up at Paul before turning back to look at Katy, who looked equally as concerned, at least at first.
"Unless…Chucky has only met the two of us, perhaps if we both got up then they wouldn't have a choice but to all come in, make the bait far to good to pass up, then…we get a priest to bless the water in a fire hydrant and when they come out we spray them all with impromptu holy water," Katy said with an excited smile on her face as she looked first to Maria and then to Paul.
"Oh no…wait a minute, there's no way…I am not going to, we're going to have to come up with another way…besides the whole priest blessing the water from the fire hydrant thing is ridiculous, it'll never work," Maria shot back with a nervous and upset pout on her face as she half stood up from her seat and stared down Katy.
"What's the problem Maria, you've more than got the looks for it, and I've seen you dance to that classical music," Diane said softly with a somewhat sly grin on her face as she turned and looked up at Maria as she crossed her arms in front of her chest and then winked suggestively at the slayer.
"I went to dance school from the time I was a little girl, I wanted to be a ballerina for years, I'm not going to get up there and dance," Maria shot back with an angry scowl on her face as she lowered her gaze back to her laptop and tried to look busy.
"What are you so afraid of, it's not like you'd be showing them something that they'd never seen before, it's not like you'd be the first naked woman that they'd ever seen, and think about it, this all works right, they'll all be dust and won't be able to tell anyone about it," Shandra asked with at first an unhappy expression on her face before she brightened up and began to tease Maria a little bit towards the end.
"It's not that, it's just that I," Maria started to say back with a nervous and scared look on her face as she hunched her shoulders a bit and blushed deeply.
"Have a fear of public nudity, don't worry about it…so did I when I first started dancing, we'll just turn the house lights up enough so that when you look out at the audience you'll only see a wall of light, helped me out a lot in the beginning, once I got through that fear then I wanted to see the audience, I wanted to know that they were having as good of a time as I was," Katy said back with a hopeful and helpful smile on her face as she walked over and patted Maria on the shoulder.
"Well if we're going to do it then we might as well figure out what you're going to wear," Gina finally spoke up with a nervous half smile on her face as she slowly rose up to her feet and held up a gym bag that had a thong hanging out of it.
END OF CHAPTER 8