My beautiful captor had lost patience with me and given up on mere words. She couldn't believe I had told her everything and pride wouldn't let her believe her dominance had failed but here I was suffering anyway as she contradicted herself by convincing herself I knew more.

"You must have it somewhere in that mad mind of yours!" she snapped angrily. "Where are the Aralu?" She struck at me hard, punching me in the face twice and causing fresh blood to bloom from my nose as she shattered it. My vision flashed to red as my mind filled with pain and my breathing suddenly became a lot harder.

"Ah Kent," Sascha purred, through just one mouth thankfully, "smell that blood do you?"

I glanced over and through a dazed vision edged with red I spied Sascha pulling back from Kent's throat, smiling with a face stained crimson. Kent was bruising with many fresh, deep bites, one at his throat, two on his chest, one on his right leg and worse, I could spy glittering carmine droplets dripping from his lower regions.

"You've lost a lot of vitae," Sascha mused as she stroked his right cheek, "poor pet but it serves me well with power. Shall we have a rest? Shall I let you feed Kent? Can you smell her blood? Isn't it good, warm and fresh?"

I heard Kent give a snarl as he pulled on his bonds.

"Yes Kent, you're close now, hmm let it come to the surface."

"Maybe that will get the truth from you," the woman in the purple dress snapped at me.

"They're in the desert," I retorted tiredly, "I've told you twice, in Egypt with the mummies, they don't eat brains you know, they just want dead princesses resurrected."

"In Egypt you suspect but what proof and where in Egypt?"

"The voices haven't shared that yet," I answered with forced merriment. "For Kent's freedom the outlook might be less cloudy. Hmm give the mind another shake and maybe the triangle says outlook good instead of ask again later."

I heard the clink of cuffs and watched as Kent was finally set free. He crumbled to the floor with a groan and a snarl and I watched in dismay as Sascha kneeled beside him. Sascha whispered something to him as he stroked his hair and suddenly Kent's grey eyes were on me and I saw a frenzy beginning. He was not going free.

"No," I whispered.

"Yes," the woman retorted cruelly, "unless you tell me more about the Aralu!"

"Go and feed pet," Sascha urged. "Drain her of the filthy Kindred blood that pollutes her." Sascha smiled my way at this. "Then I can replace it with my own, you will want to tell me all about the Aralu then."

"You stay still and endure it," the woman ordered me in a voice heavy with dominance.

Kent came crawling across the floor rapidly, hissing and bearing his fangs as he did. I hoped and prayed it was a ruse. My hands dug into the edges of the chair as I turned rigid against it. I couldn't move, no bond but a voice held me and it was enough!

I screamed as Kent's fangs tore into my throat violently and he started to drain my blood. There was no gentleness, no attempt to put me under, nothing but sharp pain as two serrated fangs pierced deep through my skin and tore it asunder to spill blood. He sucked hard at the wound, bruising the flesh about it as he drank greedily at my blood.

"Enough!" Sascha cried out.

Kent ignored.

Sascha did not order a second time, she came forward and grabbed Kent by the scruff of his hair. With help from the olive skinned woman she dragged him kicking and howling back to his chains and restrained him once more. Sascha looked over at me angrily. "You tell us everything or I will start taking limbs from him!"

"You always were theatrical Vykos."

I couldn't believe it, the voice, master! Was he still master? I was sagging in the chair, head slumping forward again my chest as I struggled even more for breath as my lungs grew tight and heavy.

"Bb...Beckett?" The beautiful woman looked stunned.

I felt shock flood through me, pure, sudden, senses freezing shock. It was Beckett's and he took a moment to compose himself from it. "Lucita I am disappointed by the company you keep," he scorned in a droll voice.

I felt cold hands upon me suddenly, wrenching me up and away from the chair, back from the monsters to safety. "What did they do to you?" Isaac demanded. "To both of you!"

"Give her back or I will take things from this Toreador he can't replace!" Sascha threatened.

"Just because you're dickless," Anatole taunted.

So many voices, I couldn't keep up with the drama now. My neck burned and I struggled for conscious as I felt the darkness begin to suck me down.

"Anatole how are you here?" the woman gasped. "I thought you were dead!"

"I am," he answered happily.

"You know what I mean," she snapped. "I thought you had given yourself up to a true death."

"If she's with Sabbat who's Judas now?" Aristotle queried haughtily.

"Still you," Anatole retorted firmly, "she's been Sabbat for a while."

"Double standards," Aristotle complained, "just like Elizabeth, signed the death warrant but didn't want it dispatched. Scots took her throne anyway."

"Sascha we're all here now, try talking for a change," Beckett urged.

"Why are you here?" I pried as I looked over at him. I was slumped back against Isaac, weak and bleeding hard.

Beckett grinned at me. "Because you're right, it's not foolish and I must always strive to do what's wise."

"How did you find us?" I quipped.

"You're my ghoul, I can find you," he assured.

"Your ghoul?" the woman, Lucita, spat out with disgust. "But you hate ghouls and really Beckett you have better standards than this!"

"And you are better than crude torture methods with a Tzimisce," Beckett scorned her. "Centuries have passed us by and yet here we are in an underground dungeon with manacles, it's so terribly medieval."

I felt Lucita's gaze upon me before she looked at Beckett again. "I am sick of the game and the control, the blood bond is ancient, if these things in the desert awaken they will enslave, control and devour."

"She means to feed on them," Aristotle hissed.

"Or maybe I just want to destroy them!" she snapped.

"If you want to come you only have to ask," Anatole said happily, "I've missed our trips together."

"Even if I mean to destroy these ancient?" Lucita queried sharply.

"If it God's will," Anatole retorted, "but if not He may bid me to smote you with a flaming sword, we shall see. The end comes no matter what, we cannot stop it."

"Well I was not expecting this," she retorted awkwardly, "or any of you."

I was growing weaker by the minute as my blood continued to flow despite Isaac's hand pressed against the wound but I would not give into oblivion while Kent was still in danger. I saw the rage growing in Sascha at his ally's hesitation and I knew Kent would pay the price. I couldn't let it happen. I fought free from Isaac with ease as he did not expect it given my weakened state and I stumbled awkwardly across the floor. I tugged out a dagger, brought in my skirt for self-defence, and I had it up at the wound at my neck just as Isaac readied to come and snatch me back.

"Sascha I will silence all the voices if you touch him!" I shrieked. "You will never learn about the Aralu then! NEVER! NO ONE WILL!"

"I won't learn about them from you anyway," Sascha retorted sulkily, "at least this way I can have some satisfaction."

Isaac moved in a blur, bypassing me and heading straight for Sascha.

"Oh dear," Beckett said dryly.

Sascha evaded the blow by dissolving into a pool of blood that reformed into the Tzimisce behind Isaac.

"I suppose we must help," Beckett said wearily. He moved forward quickly without Isaac's speed, conjuring the brute strength of a Gangrel as he readied his claws.

I moved too despite my pain, running to Sascha with a burning rage. The Tzimisce was laughing, even when Isaac struck a blow he laughed.

I neared Kent and his eyes burned red as my blood taunted him. He started to scream as he fought against his bonds frantically.

Sascha dissolved into blood to avoid an attack from either side by Beckett and Isaac. The pair narrowly avoided a collision thanks to Isaac's speed.

"The blood rises in the west," the voices murmured, "where the dead lie." I followed their guidance in time to greet Sascha as he arose from a blood pool. I shoved the dagger hard into his right eye and smiled.

Sascha smiled back as he rewarded me by forcing his claws deep into my ribcage, tearing through bone and muscle.

"ARIADNE!"

Isaac tugged me back as Sascha ripped a hole through me. He missed my heart but it didn't matter, he took enough blood and guts with him for the damage to be fatal.

I continued to smile as I fell. I was saturated in blood now and my vision was dimming. I had lost too much but I had hurt the monster for Kent and if it meant Kent survived then it was okay.

I fell to the ground at last as my body turned numb and the pain faded. I was cold, it was dark and I couldn't hear anymore. I filled with frustration, I just wanted a few more seconds, I needed to know that Kent was safe. It took all my strength to try and focus my eyes again, all the energy I could muster but it didn't last long. All I got was a final image of Aristotle in the distance behind Isaac and Beckett looking down at me with a thoughtful curiosity.

The voice perked up at this and I realised numbly why he had helped me to come here and risk my mortality. He only wanted to keep me alive to get to the desert if death was the only other alternative but he had gazed ahead and seen another path. He had made another move on the chessboard of Jyhad and it was going to succeed. I could hear him urging the whispers in Aristotle's head to start murmuring the same idea. I wanted to laugh bitterly at how we had been played for puppets, how I was moved through the stages of life and death at Malkav's will and not my own. I could do nothing however as it was far too late.

"I want her."

I looked to the deep voiced speaker unseen. He stood with another, both more than they appeared, they hummed with power. They had their backs to me, two tall, muscular males in colourful robes and glistening with metallic adornments, they hugged at a fat marble pillar, spying around it like shy schoolboys. What held their devotion was a woman whose form I was starting to see frequently, a beautiful dancer with olive skin and jet black hair, silver footed and shiny eyed with a pearly smile. I had never seen anyone with her beauty or grace. She moved lithely to soft music, swaying her hips seductively whilst playing ignorance to her watchers. I knew that she seen them, that she was aware of how they observed, ensnared as she flung her dark locks about to catch under the light of the pale moon and stretched her long arms up to greet its rays.

"I cannot do it," the speaker murmured woefully, "the risk of her hate is too much."

"Then let me do it lord," the second male spoke up eagerly. "Let me see if I can make a Childe and let me make a gift of her to you."

There was the sound of clapping as another joined the fray. A young male wearing the mask of a grinning wolf skipped up to her before dancing in wild abandon. He had none of her grace or charm but yet there was an appeal with him too. The woman seemed happy for his presence, laughing in mirth at his antics before she grasped both his hands and swung in a circle with him.

"And what of him lord?" the second male quipped warily. "I'm told he scared the servants this morning, they found his chamber full of frogs and him addressing them like people!"

"She would be unhappy without him," the first male murmured.

The wolf masked man broke from the woman and pushed his mask up into his jet black locks. He halted and turned his head up to the moon curiously. "Do you hear the moon sister?" he queried seriously. "Whispering ancient secrets to us."

"What you give to him you give to her," the first male instructed quietly, "for she loves him and her love is a deep passion."

"Love can be a curse," the second male retorted grimly.

"Ariadne it's alright, I'm here to keep the voices quiet this time."

"Ugh you Toreadors are always so woefully dramatic. Honestly, what is it about this...you know I don't even know what to call her, curious she's survived this many transformations but I digress, what is it that makes you all lose your senses so openly for her? If it's not Beckett in here reading to her about dinosaurs it's Kent pleading to her or you telling tales about how things will be with you and her."

"You know I can kick you off this train to burn in the desert."

Voices, familiar voices somewhere near and yet so far. I felt like I was trapped, drowning in a dark pool, pressed up against an unseen glass pane trying to break through. Yes, that was it wasn't it? I'd always been here in the mind but it was crowded and hard to win control. For a time there'd been fewer, when we...no when I'd fallen from the web. Then, without warning, we...no I...had been ensnared in the web again and the spider had at long last been set free to scuttle back to the centre. Many flies had come then, many voices from the hive wanting to have a go at control. They had told Sarah that Ariadne was just a voice to be banished, that she wasn't real, that Sarah should let someone else take charge.

"Ariadne I know you're afraid after everything you have suffered and that you must be confused. I know you're hurting too and you've had too many voices telling you what to do now, too many masters but please, remember my voice is the one than silences the others. Remember that I have never wanted to control you but that I want you to only be you, no matter the name you choose. Remember that I love you."

"Love, God if I have to listen to another night of this you can throw me to the desert," someone retorted rudely.

I heard the noise of metal scraping and creaking and then there was the roar of wind and the feel of the coolness of a foreign night air upon my skin. It caressed me gently bringing in the scent of ancient sands and forgotten tombs.

"I spoke in haste! Come now Isaac you didn't bring me this far just to do this and it is very crude for a Toreador!"

There was a heavy sigh before the metal creaked again and the wind fell silent. He always liked to sigh for theatrics even though he had no need to do it. Love, he had said those precious three words but was it more than foolish sentiment this time or just another dramatic declaration of emotion to be broken or retracted as he had done before?

"Forever Ariadne," he murmured, "I will love you forever. I will love you even if you are struck mortal again or ghoul or the Tzimisce mutilate you. I will love you no matter what you look like or what name you choose. I will love you if you lie with my ghoul or others. I will love you if you help the Camarilla or even the Sabbat. From now until Gehenna I swear it, just come back to me again, break through the madness and take control."

"How did you ever find the time to be a Baron? Surely your talents are better suited to writing sub par sonnets," someone sneered. They regretted it immediately and shouted. "No, I was just joking! For God's sake don't open that door again! You are so easily offended, one would think a leader would have a thicker skin."

"Like you LaCroix? Didn't you stake three Kindred and let them thirst for two days simply for calling you a weak figurehead? Or rather, didn't you have one of your minions do it for you because you always have to keep your dainty hands clean?"

I smiled at this, it was rare for Isaac to get in verbal spats but when he did he always knew the most amusing insults to offer.

"Pah! One shouldn't believe all the rumours, it was one Kindred, he wasn't staked, he called me a clueless clown if you must know and he was a Nosferatu anyway, probably Gary put him up to it. I heard you are just a figurehead in Hollywood, that another Toreador secretly pulls your strings, is that to be believed or can we accept that sometimes rumours are just that?"

"Isaac is no puppet," I piped up, trying to sound fierce and failing as my voice was hoarse, "he is the Baron. The child was sent on a goose chase but alas no goose, I tried to find the golden goose too but Ash keeps it hidden with his snakes, selfish Toreador won't share the golden feathers for my hat," I pouted.

"Ariadne!" My Toreador was upon me quickly, pulling me upright to my feet and greeting me with a wide smile and amber eyes full of happiness and warmth. I smiled back and welcomed his deep kiss. His mouth was cold and his tongue had the lingering taste of coppery blood to it but it only filled me with pleasure. I had a hungering for the blood that had been gone for a time but never forgotten, now it came in a warm murmur that threatened to turn into a burning demand.

Isaac pushed me back and looked to me curiously. "It is you, isn't it?"

"Hmm as much me as I can be I suppose." I pressed my tongue up and probed the two fangs there. "I think the fangs are longer this time," I mused, "all the better to bite with, oh but how will I fool the children in red? Granny what long fangs you have, nope shan't do." I shook my head mournfully.

Isaac smiled at me and pressed the tip of his nose against mine lightly. "I was always wary of you being a Malkavian again, I selfishly wanted you Kindred again of course but to be Kine again was a gift and yet now, at long last I can say I am glad for it. Not that I will ever thank Aristotle," he added angrily with a frown, "he did it without asking and he certainly didn't do it for you. He even admitted to it, the cretin said we had to bring him along after all that, that you would need him." Isaac sighed again as he pulled back from me. "He wasn't wrong, it took you three nights to change and then for another three nights you haven't known yourself, only Aristotle was able to get you to feed."

I was confused and cocked my head from side to side as I tried to recall this. I tensed feeling Sascha's claws within me and looked down. I was wearing a stylish black, silk shirt which gave me no indication of possible wounds below. "What about Kent?" I queried worriedly. I could see him screaming and straining against his chains as his eyes burned red and the thirst dominated him.

"He is with us," Isaac assured.

I looked up to the Baron curiously. "What does that mean?"

Our companion, briefly forgotten in our romantic uniting, let out a snort of mockery and sneered, "she's still got her clan's knack for observation. Although, I always felt it was more prominent in her than most."

I turned to face him. "Fallen prince," I murmured. He still managed to give off an air of condescending arrogance despite his condition, bond in heavy iron chains that kept his hands and feet restrained together though he was unbound to anything else. He was wearing a charcoal suit with a formerly white shirt now speckled in dirt and blood and no tie. His upper lip was pulled higher than it should be exposing his fangs and his eyes' lids were drawn back leaving his eyeballs more exposed than they should be. He needed to feed. I wondered at his attire and presence briefly before I returned my attention to Isaac. "Where is Kent?"

Isaac gave me a hopeful smile before he glanced to a door on the right. "We will go to him, perhaps seeing you as you are might finally make him happy." He gripped my right hand tightly and began to guide me to the door, pausing to glower back at Sebastian disapprovingly. "You may hope Kent is in better form," he said warningly, "it is only for him that you still get to see these nights."

"Yes, yes," Sebastian retorted dismissively. "Just get me some vitae already then make your threats."

Isaac opened the door and pulled me through. We were on a train, one without windows, modern with wide compartments lit with bright, white bulbs in false candles in the walls. It hummed quietly, moving rapidly across iron tracks carrying us to destiny across the land of the Pharaohs.

We were in a compartment occupied with chairs screwed to the floor and facing a single television, books and weapons, one weary looking Japanese girl feasting on noodles and watching cartoons until we arrived, and a sombre Toreador polishing a set of guns obsessively.

"Kent," Isaac called down to him gently as we stopped before him.

"They look shiny," I approved, "you should polish my button collection next, they must be very dirty dwelling in Ash's boots."

He froze up, halting in his actions as if Medusa had ensnared him. Suddenly he was on his feet and staring at me, moving too quick for me to catch it. He studied me warily, suspicious and anxious.

"Can we build sandcastles soon?" I queried hopefully. "Plenty of sand here."

He grabbed me without warning, pulling me into a fierce hug and burrowing his head against my hair as his arms squeezed me tight. "Damn I love you batshit crazy," he murmured, "never fucking leave again."

Well it had to happen, right?

Also, I'm considering one day writing an origins fic about the Third Generation, would it interest anyone?