"Not this again!" Kent snapped in annoyance.

I looked at him and the others in surprise, none of them were reacting to the flames at the door. "Why don't you see it?!" I shrieked in alarm and frustration. "There's fire! We're going to burn! WE'RE GOING TO BURN!"

"Nani?" Yukie was looking at me with unease.

Ash rolled his eyes in disgust before moving in a blur. Rob let out a snarl of warning and I flinched as I felt a rush of air as the Toreador brushed past me before halting at the door. He placed a palm against it and into the fire before sneering at me. "Dead you're mad and alive you're madder, it's like you have rabies or something," he snapped, "you should be put down."

I shook my head as the flames continued to spread. "No, no there's fire!" I looked to Isaac pleadingly. "Please, we need to go, we need to go before we burn!They're coming to burn us!"

I felt Isaac's hands about me in an attempt to soothe me but I refused to be pandered to. "WE'RE GOING TO BURN!"

"Christ maybe we should get her outside for a bit of air or something," Kent muttered.

"The fires of Hell can not be avoided," Anatole said confidently, "but perhaps the burn can be delayed."

I looked to the door again, it had almost burned through revealing more flames and the lurking form of something I was certain was Sabbat. I saw its clawed hand reaching for Ash and I pulled away from Isaac to run to Ash.

"Get off me!" Ash snarled hatefully as I grabbed him by the lapels of his blazer and tugged him away from the door. He pushed me hard with both hands sending me hurtling back. I would have hit the wall but Isaac grabbed me in time to prevent the blow.

"You bastard haven't you learned not to touch her!" Rob shouted, his voice deep with the guttural snarl of a wolf.

"Don't!" I protested as I saw claws and fur sprout from Rob's hands. "We need to go! Please we need to go! WE'LL BURN! WE'LL BURN!"

"Shit let's just do it!" Kent snapped with a look of unease.

"Out the back," I pleaded. "Please Isaac," I begged, "please quickly, please, please, please."

The Baron looked down at me with apprehension before he finally moved to obey. "Everyone out," he commanded.

"Isaac you can't be serious!" Ash protested angrily.

"Isaac there's no fire," V.V pointed out.

Isaac's presence filled the room without warning filling it with rage and dread. "Out now," he ordered in a calm but serious voice.

Isaac and I left hand in hand. The Baron pulled me along in a rush of movement that made me feel nauseous as we left through a side door to a narrow back corridor that exited out the back of the jewellers.

Soon we were all outside standing on the edge of the hill the back of the jeweller's looked over appearing very sheepish.

"We fled for a nutcase's delusions," Ash grumbled sullenly.

BOOM!

I was pushed down in a hurry as glass and bricks sprayed out in all directions as the jewellers went up in a roar of crimson flames. I tasted dirt and my ears were full of a ringing noise as all chaos broke out. I couldn't hear or see but I could sense movement all around me and feel the heat of the scorching flames. The fire had to be real this time, a bomb! I tried to lift my head but was sent back to the ground and into a painful oblivion by something smacking hard against the back of my skull.

I felt something nudging me and awoke with a soft cry. I was sore and heavy, my limbs were tangled up in sheets of some description and my body was stiff from having slumbered curled up in a ball. When I felt something damp and cold press up against my cheek I flinched but when the warm, wet kiss of a canine's tongue followed I was soothed instantly.

I turned to look at the weary crimson gaze of a large, white wolf. Satisfied that I was in some state of calmness the head lowered back to the wooden floor and the eyes closed as the wolf went back to the deep slumber only the vampires were capable of. Sleep, always a fine line between living and dead but more so for those already undead.

I struggled to remember how I had come to be here. There had been violence, blood, madness and nightmares. Sabbat. They had come in the early evening to try and blow the Baron of Hollywood away. They were after me and Anatole. The Gangrels growling for the Malkavian had made that clear.

Anatole, a Malkavian raving of Gehenna, he had made little sense to the Toreadors but plenty to me. He spoke of the Aralu thirsting and calling as they stirred from torpor, he understood their hold on me. The mad prophet knew the deep hunger they would have when they awoke. When...not if...was that the voice's certainty? Malkav, master of madness, so certain that the powers of the ancient four could restore him somehow. He had whispered of Anatole's restoration...restoration? Was I not the first to surface from the dead?

There had not been much time for chat. The Tzimisce were after me and Anatole too and then there was Beckett. My master had always had a rivalry with Sascha, the shape maker would destroy the wolf if he could.

There had been a fight. A bloody battle on the shady hills of Hollywood that held so many secrets from the tinsel town. There were bodies in the hills- drug users who had stolen from dealers, prostitutes abused beyond recognition, Z-list actors and actresses who had given up, B-List stars who knew too many secrets about the A-Listers and needed silenced. The ugly side of Hollywood was eternally in the shadows, the perfect place for a vampire battle to be carried out under the noses of the Kine.

After the battle Isaac had debated over the choice for action whilst Beckett had tried to wrestle some sense from Anatole. I had been dizzy, blood had gushed from my head and I had felt sick and the world had been spinning.

Sascha had not been there, it was underlings instead- Gangrel and Brujah mostly with one Tzimisce. The battle had been minor, spilled into the presence of Kine on the hills only briefly and easily covered up with stories of Hollywood special effects and a stunt to drum up attention for an upcoming horror film. The underlings had been no match for the Baron never mind Kent, Ash, V.V, Ginger, Beckett, Anatole and Romero and Yukie. Heather had shown no fear, she was tough but she just couldn't fight. I tried to remember what I had done but it was a blur of red.

Bickering amongst the Toreador brat children had followed. Ash had accused Isaac of favouritism towards me, snapping that once again my presence had brought trouble to them and once again Isaac had allowed his own childe to suffer out of preference to me.

I struggled to think on it and got only flashes of red and burning pain for a moment. There had been so much fire and blood. Where were we now? Isaac! Where was he? I let out a scream.

The wolf was up again, whining and nudging at me anxiously.

"Isaac?" I croaked as I looked to the wolf. I didn't remember... Remember!

The wolf licked my nose.

"What happened?" I croaked as I struggled to recall. How was I was here with master wolf? Where was here? I tried to detangle myself from the sheets in a panic when the wolf suddenly planted a heavy paw on me, pushing me down to the ground on my back. He let out a low whine before he released me and trotted off.

I listened as his claws scratched at wood three times and then there was the beeping of a code being entered, the clicks of latches and locks and the turning of keys before the low creak of a metal door being opened followed.

"I keep forgetting how big you are for a wolf," I heard Romero's voice grumble.

"Romero!" I called out anxiously as I fought against the sheets again.

"Ah, okay so you don't need let out for a wee then?" Romero queried dryly. "Please stop giving me that look it was just a joke." I heard footsteps follow and then a low, weary chuckle. "Stay still crazy cat you've gotten yourself all tangled up."

"Isaac, fire, Sabbat," I babbled, "blood and red and pain and the old ones stretching from the sand."

Romero kneeled down and pressed a palm against my right cheek. "Settle, Isaac is fine, pissed off and mourning his lost jewels but fine and the insurance company will cover the loss, fire didn't spread much before the brigade arrived. Lucky your uncanny sense for disaster got us out of there before the bomb went off."

I waited impatiently as Romero helped me from the sheets. "What happened?" I queried quietly.

"Well the Sabbat tried to blow us to kingdom come and failed and then Isaac turned them to ashes with a little help from the rest of us. Then you started babbling something about things or vampires in the desert and that other nutjob joined in and insisted we had only faced the weak foot soldiers and that more would come. It turned into a thing and some hunters showed up and some more Sabbat and we had to go."

"Where?" I pried quietly as I struggled to remember.

"To the sewers, Isaac's idea of hell but he's not Baron for nothing, he has sense, he kept a clear access to and through the sewers in case we ever needed the escape route. Not that he was escaping, course not, Kine were getting too interested and his sanctuary is a little charred." He grinned suddenly. "Must say, I'd forgotten what it was like to kill with something other than a gun, little too messy but not bad."

I caught a flashback of Romero using a large serrated knife to hack at a Sabbat Brujah, messy was the word.

"We got out?" I queried quietly, disbelieving.

Romero frowned at me as he drew me up into a sitting position. "You got amnesia?" He cocked his head curiously at this. "You fought like a possessed hellcat, like someone else was in charge, I suppose in your case maybe someone else was."

Self-preservation mad one, do not think otherwise. The sulking voice trapped within.

"But you wanted this one sacrificed," I murmured back.

Yes but now the mad prophet has brought us a new path so you have a reprieve. Until we reach the desert you live.

"The memories are not mine to have," I mumbled, "the master voice is fickle, dead he is free, living he is trapped, he wavered the chance of freedom to linger on until we reach the ancients."

"Uh huh," Romero murmured dryly. "You know I doubled back when the sun came up, Isaac's orders, travelled above ground of course. Hollywood is crawling with Sabbat ghouls and hunters, if you hadn't warned us..."

"Where are we?" I quipped. I glanced about the room at last. It was simple, plain and had an odd odour lingering in it that smelled a little like damp faeces and warm piss.

"Well this is the thing," Romero mused, "we didn't really have a lot of notice or options so we had to pick something that wasn't obvious. A place the Toreador wouldn't normally go."

I could see him fighting back a smile. "Are they all here?" I wondered aloud.

Romero nodded. "Oh yes, Isaac, V.V, Ash, Ginger, Kent, and Rob and Damsel of course, and the mad guy, and Beckett, well you know he's here." Romero nodded to the doorway the white wolf sat in looking at us impatiently from.

"Where?" I queried.

"The outskirts of town, an old, abandoned factory that used to be in the business of waste management. There's a dump out the back, buried but you can tell."

"How are they even sleeping here?" I marvelled.

Romero snickered. "Kent kept repeating to himself over and over, 'it's just a bad dream', V.V near fainted, always thought she looked pale but damn did she look pale coming here, Rob and Damsel practically had to wrestle Ash in."

"What are they sleeping in?"

Romero's smile widened. "Well now we're getting to the best bit." He nodded to the wolf again. "It's wolfman there who brought help in. For a loner he's got some interesting contacts," he added sardonically.

I looked at my master with pride. "He is very useful with many who owe favours to him."

"Yes, well, one of those many happens to be a Nosferatu, I swear Kent near shit at the sight of him. Had to lie and tell Kent it was a Nosferatu ghoul that brought in his coffin, even at that he wanted to bleach the whole thing. Isaac had use to some serious presence on them to get them to go to bed for the morning."

I glanced from Romero to Beckett and then back to Romero. "My head struggles to make sense of this," I confessed, "and it hurts."

"Well the short version is this- we got ambushed by some Sabbat scum, they tried to bomb us but you saw it coming before it happened, we got out and defeated them but we had to leave because that mad blond and you kept insisting the...Tzimisce fucks were coming.

Course Isaac wasn't doing any of the fleeing shit, he was furious about them attacking his home, so he got his army riled up before we quit the city. Only reason he didn't stay to head them off is because you got yourself in a state about the whole thing, started crying about Alex and how Isaac would be next and then you did your whole doomsday thing, blondie chimed in and by the end of it Isaac got so concerned he made V.V, Ash and Ginger come along too. Beckett had to talk him down with regards to the army, said it might draw the attention of Kine but Isaac wasn't leaving his barony ripe for the taking either. He left and told his guys to be defensive until offensive became a necessity.

During all that time Beckett reached out to his contacts and he found a way out with a hideaway en route that no one would expect to find Toreadors in. Thing is I don't know if we can go back so easily, Isaac's gonna need the army I think."

"We fled."

Romero nodded sombrely as he dropped the pretence. "Yeah but don't dare say that to Isaac. You got him to come crazy cat don't make him feel guilty over it."

I looked at Beckett and wondered at last why he was a wolf. "Master should be slumbering," I murmured.

"Yeah another aspect of your madness," Romero grumbled, "you went crazier than usual for you, all that screaming about fire, ancients, a desert, the Tzimisce and then you were babbling about Alex, someone called Malkav I think and that guy used to be Prince...LaCroix, you just went nuts. Isaac couldn't calm you and there was this blood pouring out of you, you were hurt bad, you fought well but you are still human, you really took a beating. Beckett had to force some blood into you but you still wouldn't calm down. Thing is, you wouldn't calm down until he turned into that wolf."

Romero nodded over to the white wolf. "Can't explain what's so comforting about a giant wolf with huge teeth but seemed to work for you."

I looked back at Beckett with gratitude. The wolf finally padded back into the room and lay back down beside me.

"Kitten I'm real tired and there's a few hours yet to sunset, why don't you settle back with Beckett and we'll talk more this evening." Romero looked at me pleadingly with bloodshot eyes.

I nodded, equally tired and still confused. My head ached and I didn't want to try and puzzle any further through this mess just yet. I moved closer to the wolf and found it oddly natural to curl up beside him. Romero fixed the sheet back around me and left me with Beckett's white fluffy tail wrapped about me.

Nightfall. I felt it as soon as I awoke, the ghost of a memory of a being who was triggered by sunset and felt every hour of the night as it passed, ever weary of the final hour that signalled the pain of sunrise. It was a few hours past sunset, perhaps ten o'clock, late but still night and not the early hours of the morning. I remained wrapped in the sheet but the wolf was beside me no more.

I panicked until I spied Beckett standing in a corner quietly watching me with his feral red gaze.

"You feel calmer," he addressed me softly, "at least as calm as one like you can be."

I nodded as I pushed back the sheet and sat up. Beckett was wearing only a loose cream shirt, brown trousers and dusty brown boots. "Does the wolf have clothes when he shifts?" I wondered aloud curiously.

For a rare moment Beckett looked briefly embarrassed before he composed himself and took a step towards me. "You know young one you seem to attract trouble to you and yet I must admit it has not been dull with you. I think if I must have a ghoul you are certainly one of the most interesting ones to have."

I grinned up at him, delighted for the compliment. He extended a hand down to me and I noticed it was without a glove for a change. Beckett had dark claws instead of nails, and fur on his knuckles too thick and wiry to be mistaken for the normal hairs a human can bear. "The mark of the beast," I murmured as I accepted the hand. I felt a prickle of discomfort and realised jarringly that it came from Beckett, not myself. "The beast within that protects this weak ghoul," I murmured, "the beast is powerful, fast and intelligent."

"Young one you don't need to stoke my ego," Beckett assured as he pulled me to my feet, "I have had the beast long enough to master and accept it. It is what it is and I wear it better than most," he added proudly. "Now," he addressed me with a twinkling crimson stare, "I have not fed yet."

"Would master make a meal of this one?" I asked quietly as I held his gaze. I should have been afraid, even as I had loved Valyrion I had been terrified of him but I could find no fear for Beckett.

"Not a meal, when I give you blood how do you see it? Am I food to you?" He grinned showing his fangs.

I shook my head hastily. "No, master's blood is a great gift, it fills me, makes me strong and warm and safe, I feel the caress of the moon with it, I feel closer to master." I looked at Beckett hopefully. "Then would it be a gift? Would you be closer to me?"

Beckett's eyes flashed with unease suddenly and he released my hand. "Yes," he answered, "and perhaps that is something we should avoid."

I filled with dismay and self-loathing. "You reject me then," I said quietly as I bowed my head.

Beckett patted me on the top of my head gently. "No but you are already too strongly under the sway of my blood, it's not fair to you, and your Baron is already quite angry with me, let's not give him an excuse to cause any unpleasantness upon myself."

Beckett turned to the only door out of the room and opened it with ease, I had to assume the locks were already open. I followed after him into a large room that had possibly served as an office once, a very long time ago. It was littered with broken tables, a typewriter missing keys, a broken lamp, some coffins and several stressed looking Toreadors and a harassed looking Nosferatu who had Romero, Rob and Damsel acting as a wall between him and the easily disgusted Toreadors.

"About time you got up," Kent snapped as he looked our way crossly. The poet looked untidy, his dark hair was askew, his designer shirt was wrinkled, and his skin wan and in need of blood.

"Where is Anatole?" Beckett queried.

"Playing with the water cooler," Romero retorted as he glanced through an open doorway to the left. "That's not even a metaphor," he added as he kept staring, "he's really doing that."

I stood up on my tiptoes and squirmed right and left in an effort to see. Unable to spy past Romero I turned my attention to the Nosferatu instead. "Nasty Dude!" I exclaimed happily. I recognised the ugly, misshapen, peach and brown form of a vampire met many months ago when I had been Kindred.

He looked over at me and his orange eyes turned surprised. I'm certain if he had eyebrows they would have been raised. "What the..." He struggled for words prompting me to wonder if his tongue had suffered some mutations since we had last met. "Wait..." He squinted slightly and took a step towards me but Rob moved to block him before he could come any closer. The Nosferatu sighed and queried sardonically, "why am I helping again? Everyone is so hostile."

"Indeed," Beckett murmured dryly, "one gets the impression certain vampires here might have preferred to burn in the sun than accept your aid, such shallow stupidity."

"I'd definitely risk sunburn rather than another day spent in a coffin an ugly, boil ridden, filthy maggot infested creature has touched," Kent blurted out hatefully.

"Thank you for holding back on your true feelings out of respect for our friend here," Beckett replied in a deadpan voice.

Kent looked confused, thrown by Beckett's almost sincere tone. "I wasn't," he grumbled.

"Let's not bicker," Isaac remarked before Beckett could retort. The Baron looked unfavourably at the Nasty Dude. "Whilst I cannot pretend to have any pleasure in receiving aid from a Nosferatu I do still have gratitude. We were in temporary need and you helped us," he said stiffly to the Nosferatu.

The Nasty Dude looked past Rob and Damsel to Isaac and sneered, "is that a thanks?"

Isaac frowned back and did not answer.

Luckily, whatever imps that plagued Anatole urged him to return to us and provide a much needed distraction. The blonde entered dramatically, thrusting his arms outwards as if pushing something away. I wondered at the possibility of an invisible foe and let out a wary snarl.

"What are you growling for, dinner?" Kent quipped moodily.

"Just warding off the elephant," I answered happily.

"What?" Damsel queried with a look of puzzlement.

"Why can't she learn not to ask," Kent grumbled.

"The elephant," I replied as I smiled at the redheaded rebel. "People always talk about an elephant in the room when none is seen, they are always an invisible presence."

"I have heard the voice of God and through him the whispers of our forefather and the clue to the desert dwellers is at the public house of knowledge," Anatole announced.

"Wait, you heard the voice of God from a dried up water cooler?" Kent queried dryly.

Anatole gave him a wilting stare. "No, that merely amplified the voice," he answered haughtily.

Ash bristled, V.V rolled her eyes and Kent cursed. Before the spoilt children of Arikel could start whining to the Baron Yukie and Heather finally returned to us. They came through another door with shared looks of dismay.

"There's nothing of note here," Heather said softly as she approached Kent. "No food, no weapons." She paused and looked at the Toreadors wearily. "Master?" she queried tentatively.

Kent glanced at his Ghoul with a mild fondness. "It's okay, we're going anyway," he answered.

"To where?" Ash demanded with a cross look at Isaac.

"To the museum," Rob answered. All of us looked to him with surprise.

"Do you hear the voices?" I queried hopefully.

Rob frowned over at me and shook his head. "No Sarah, I just watch t.v now and again, there was an advert for a new exhibition- treasures of Egypt. Lot of sand in Egypt," he glanced over at Anatole, "can't be a coincidence."

"Really?" Kent queried bitingly. "You're going with that, that sand in Egypt and these two talking about deserts means it's definitely Egypt? Do you know where else there's a lot of sand Rob? FUCKING ALMOST EVERY BEACH IN THE WORLD!"

Rob's eyes flashed red as he let out a furious snarl and turned an expression of animalistic rage upon the Toreador.

Kent bristled too, clenching his fists tight as he drew himself upright and cursed again.

"Hey asshole," Damsel remarked with a glare at Kent as she slipped her right hand about Rob's left arm, "public house of knowledge, that would be a museum wouldn't it?" She gripped Rob's arm lightly and I watched in fascination as she leaned up to him fearlessly and whispered something in his ear.

My brother calmed almost instantly and the red glow faded from his eyes. I felt Beckett's intrigue and mild envy as he watched Rob curiously.

Kent smoothed back his dark hair with his right hand but the spikes almost instantly shot up again. He started pacing back and forth with an anxious shake of his head. "This place smells so bad," he complained, "I can't think straight and no one else bloody can. God that odour of sewage is nauseating. Public house of knowledge, could be a library couldn't it? Hell who cares?! Are we indulging this madman?" He gestured to Anatole wildly.

"What about me?" I queried quietly. "I see the four in the hot deserts too," I reminded them, "it makes my head hurt and sometimes they make me bleed, even from far away they might devour me." I looked to Isaac pleadingly. "I want it to end, I want the master voice freed from me, then they all might fall silent. Please."

Isaac sighed before stepping up to me and gripping my hands lightly in his own. "Alright," he said softly. "First I'll need someone to scout out Hollywood," he glanced to Ash, V.V and Ginger, "to see if it is safe for you three to return and take charge in my absence."

"Oh come on Isaac," Ash protested, "the Sabbat run us out and you just let them? You're the Baron, you need to go back and sort it!"

"Ash stop," V.V scolded. She looked to Isaac and gave him a sweet smile. "We can do this," she assured.

"No army unless it's necessary," Isaac warned, "defence before offence until I return." He turned his attention back to me and squeezed my hands. "I feel our home is probably safe from those fiends now because it is you they want and yet because I fear for you Ariadne I take no happiness from this. If you feel we need to see this matter of the four ancients through then that is what we shall do. Shall we start with the museum?"

I nodded eagerly. "Yes, they have dinosaurs, rowar!"