Session Six
Wherever Away

"I am a man more sinned against than sinning."
--King Lear

There was the faint sound of a sizzling in the distance as a drained figure stood over the steaming hot stove, one hand resting lazily over the handle of a pot while the other hand been leaning against the edge of the machine, keeping the man propelled upright. His soft brown eyes with amber speckles like rains in the skies stared dazedly at the misty haze through the heat, his head tilted slightly in a tired manner that revealed his state of condition; though he appeared youthful, his current disposition gave him the impression of a weary old man.

Vincent Halcross had been standing around here for quite some time, watching the soup swirl into a mass set of ingredients that consisted of beef, pork, rice, corn, carrots, and anything else that he could find from the closet and toss into the mushroom broth. He had nothing better to do and the coffee was starting to wear itself down by the mug, seeing that he had nothing much better to do other than to fight his insomnia, he kept himself occupied with his cooking perfection that had only gotten better over the years. However, the further he got into the cooking process he'd started to lean sideways towards the island within the kitchen of his apartment, holding himself up by his feeble hands.

For the longest time he'd been having the same nightmares, a repetition that he'd been tired of just as much as he'd been from devoid of rest, and with that he was in no disposition to take himself into a sleep and allow it to happen again. The more he'd close his eyes or run his hand through his black hair to ease himself from his tormenting memoir, they would only return to bring back a worse image than before.

The image of Eyrie, who had been nailed up upon the stake with her arms strung out wide and her legs pinned together by a metal rod, a trident, with her eyes torn out and nothing left but the dark abyss of her blackened sockets, enough for him to poke his fingers through the holes of her eyes. Her blonde hair was almost no longer visible to have ever been that color, but a deep scarlet that made up of a large wound on the side of her head; part of her skull had been fractured. The worse part about that image of Eyrie was that she was still alive, and she was suffering.

Some might say that it was just a mere dream, because it would be hard for anyone to have seen things like that nowadays. You don't come across those sorts of deaths anymore; crucifixion and stabbings. It would all be done in the similar fashion, but it was much more clean and difficult to be tracked by modern technology. Even if they had been able to track Eyrie's murderers in any way, there would have been no way that the law enforcement would have been enough to take them down.

There was a sound of an approaching individual coming up from behind the contemplative figure that made up Vincent Halcross, a hand in the pocket of his tunic as he turned to the tired man with genuine concern for his health. It wasn't so much that he feared for his life, because Vincent wasn't much of one who would, in any way, die from illness, but the lack of rest could lead to a type of insanity that they could not afford, because to some people this man was still of some use to them. He was the last link to the Death Child, their only way of tracing her.

Orpheus clacked to the kitchen with his cane, his head inclined upright as he took a smell through the air, smiling while his eyes remained closed behind the wool cloth that appeared almost to have been some sort of blindfold, yet it was just a tool to conceal his blinded eyes, that were now white without pupils or irises, though once upon a time they had been a soft ginger hue.

While his smile remained there had been a furrow in his eyebrows that revealed his disquiet for the young man, the way he allowed himself to become defused from strength by his devoid of rest; it had begun to weaken him further. Of course, Orpheus had known this just as much as Vincent had, so there wasn't anything new to point out here, hence why they both kept their silence for the first few moments until the younger looking man had finally pulled his pot of soup away from the counter and swung himself around, turning to face the blind man with a raven cane.

"You have not been resting." Orpheus seemed to have had this knack for stating the obvious sometimes, and it wasn't often. This happened to have been one of those times that Vincent really disliked him for being that way; like he didn't know.

Slowly he turned back and started taking out some other utensils to help stir the contents within the pot, his discolored eyes shifting so that he would not have been facing Orpheus the time he'd say it. "'I'll sleep when I'm dead.'" His voice was quiet and somnolent as Vincent took up a small piece of bacon from the pot, glancing over his shoulder lethargically as he tossed it languidly into his mouth, the edges of his lips twitched into a idle, almost disconcerting grin. "Famous words of Warren Zevon."

There was a faint smile that crossed Orpheus's lips as he inclined his head upright a little and gave him a brief nod in agreement. While it seemed like the right thing for someone like him to say at the time would have been something approving, like "that's right" or something wise like that. But judicious as the man was, he had not said anything, because to him silence was what had proven a man to be wiser. Vincent had come to have the ability to read this man's mind over the years, making it easier to understand his indirect innuendos when he would speak.

"So, is that all that you came here for? To tell me how to be a good boy?" Vincent irritably asked, taking out a bowl from his cabinet and settled it down onto the counter, knowing well that he lacked the courtesy for Orpheus than to ask him if he cared for a bowl of soup as well. He wasn't in the mood to make a dinner for two anyway, or to make an excuse for Orpheus to stay here any longer, and chances are, Orpheus knew well of that. This would have to be a rather quick conversation, no other explanation.

Shaking his head and pressing his weight further towards his cane, Orpheus smiled slightly and tilted his head to the side a little more. "That's not how it is at all, Vincent. I just came here to check on your current state of health, in which, from what I perceive at least, doesn't seem like you are feeling all that up to par."

Forcing out a mocking shrill of laughter, Vincent glanced over to the man once more with a harsh glare in his eyes. "Oh yes, because I know that you care for me so much, is that what you are trying to convince me of, old man?" He grinned maliciously as he turned away towards the bowl and took out a spoon from the cabinet, throwing it into the bowl. What brought him an even greater pleasure was the sight of Orpheus's frown. Knowing that what he had said had induced the man to create such an image had made him feel like he had somehow accomplished well in something.

"It isn't like that." Like he was trying to prove something here, act like he cared.

His eyes shifted towards the coffee maker; reaching over to pull the tank from underneath the machine, Vincent sighed and grabbed one of the used mugs from the side of the sink, cascading it into the mug and handing it over to Orpheus, who was hesitant to take it before he reached back and pulled the lukewarm glass and smelled it. Black. With a single sip, the edges of his lips twitched as he turned his head back up towards Vincent's general direction. "What's it like then?" Vincent muttered through his clenched teeth.

Orpheus shrugged impassively. "The usual likeliness in the way things have been, which I can't say is really good. They haven't been for quite some time, what with Ravine gone missing for the passed few months, and the Nyne after me and Kaligar and the child we have."

It hadn't been so much the fact that Orpheus and Kaligar were being chased by the Nyne, seeing that it had been habitual for all of them for the passed few months. It had been going on for a couple hundred years now, so they had taken the ability of hiding themselves into an art. The fact that they were taking a demon child along with them hadn't also been a shock, either, but it had been when he mentioned of Ravine's disappearance was something that had caused Vincent to turn to Orpheus fully, his eyes slightly wide with shock. This wouldn't have been the first time, after all, that Ravine had gone missing, but to put it mildly, that they're blood relation was close; close enough for him to worry every time she would pull something like this, and often it had bothered him. Hell, who wouldn't have been bothered, anyway?

Quickly, Vincent retorted. "What do you mean by 'gone missing', Orpheus?"

With a content smile, Orpheus nodded. Apparently the old man had known Vincent more than he would have liked; a smile that had faded once he returned to the reality that consisted within this conversation, and realizing that it was best to keep a stern disposition. "The last we saw of the girl, was when she delivered us the child. She said that it was a Rue Ezai kin, a rare species that you don't see much of, not in full blood at least." He shook his head a little and sighed. "As for Ravine, we don't know. She left us after Kaligar took care of her wounds--"

"She was hurt?"

Almost surprised, Orpheus raised his eyebrows that almost disappeared behind his sandy hair, his hand gripping the top of his cane a little more as he brought the mug to his lips while he spoke. "You didn't think that she would have gone off like so and not manage to get at least a few bumps and bruises, right? She took on the head of the Rue Ezai, and that meant that she was fending off thirteen demons. It was amazing that she hadn't died...or at least had more wounds than she already had." He surveyed the look upon Vincent's façade before Orpheus set the mug back onto the counter, turning back towards Vincent's direction. "Look, just see it this way...that she could have gotten it so much worse than she had. She was lucky that she managed to get out in such a clean way, and not get followed. But there are more, and they will come along sometime as well one of these days, sooner or later, to claim their heir."

Vincent's face twisted into a curious visage. "What's so special about the child?"

"Well, she's a Rue Ezai, we know that. Her parents, Akiehs and Tehcracs, had died when she had been on the mission to assassinate their clan members. But the clan was after their child because she isn't normal in a sense of their kind, unlike the usual Rue Ezai of Nior." His face screwed somewhat just then. "There's still the underlings though, and they'll try to take this child as well. We don't entirely know where we are going to take her...the fosters that raised you and the ones that took Ravine in had died a long time ago."

"More like killed." Vincent corrected and then looked down at his soup before taking up his spoon and scooping in a mouthful. It had been a while since he'd ever tasted something anything close to this; something that was made difficult to describe the taste. His nose wrinkled slightly as he looked up to face Orpheus once more. "So what do you plan to do with it?"

"Her." Orpheus smiled grimly. "We decided to call her Corsis, since it seemed to suit her very well."

"That means 'enigma', right?" Vincent mused over the significance of the title, yet his mind hadn't been working all that right since his insomnia was first induced. He glanced back to the coffee can and thought that he'd make some more to keep him awake.

Nodding, Orpheus ran his hand through his hair and turned to look out the window, which was positioned above the sink. "It seemed like the most fitting thing right now for her, since we had to call her something and Ravine told us that she didn't have much of one...her parents gave her no name." Both Orpheus as well as Vincent had been curious why that was, though the both of them had kept their inquiries silent and to themselves. "Either way, Ravine is out there somewhere, and she's making a sufficient endeavor in keeping herself from our contact."

Vincent grimaced dismally. "Can't say that I blame her."

Again, Orpheus nodded. "I know."

There was another awkward moment of silence. Vincent remembered that a few centuries ago there had been this theory that someone had been looking into these sorts of things in every conversation, because within one there had always been a moment of silence. They had tested so based on the amounts of people that were interacted within the discussion, how many silent moments that was engaged, and for how long they would last. This one would probably have been a minute or two, while Orpheus continued to face towards the window, although he was aware that his lacking of sight wouldn't have permitted him to see anything at all beyond his cloth. Vincent remained eating away at his soup contentedly before he cleared his throat and looked up at the blind man, blinking for a moment before clearing his through.

"Right. Well, best be going." Orpheus groped for the mug on the counter and took a final sip, taking a heavy breath afterwards as Vincent rushed over and took the glass before he had inadvertently been prepared to have allowed the mug to drop onto the floor without knowing. As much as Orpheus was used to his blindness, it had not increased anything other than his alternate senses.

Without qualms, Vincent just nodded and looked down at his soup, setting it next to the sink and preparing himself to make another batch of coffee that he had used up yesterday morning, yawning as he peered down at the machine through one eye as Orpheus made a turn to walk out, only to have mentioned one other thing. However, from within his yawn his ears had popped, and his mouth was open wide so he could not protest, and by the time that he had snapped his lips together so that he could speak once more, the man was gone and out the door.

Not much of a bad thing, really. As a matter in fact, Vincent had been counting the seconds as to when that blind man would make his way out, since he'd been seeing too much of him and his friend for his liking as of late. To be truthful, he couldn't entirely blame Ravine one single bit for her leaving, because that way at least she didn't have to put up with any of the Nyne to have her forced and beaten around, unlike the one that he'd currently become. Shameful as that realization might've been, Vincent had lost all reason to care what became of him now, seeing that he had nothing left to create such an opposition towards the Nyne anymore, all other will within him had suddenly given in. Once the reason to care is gone, one just becomes a walking empty bottle, wandering to find what had been missing only to find that there was nothing left to begin gain back anymore. He didn't want to restart the pain that had been bestowed upon both him and Ravine once more, although he knew well that Ravine's penance was by far worse than his; it always had been that way in a sense.

Gritting his teeth as he slipped the grains into the machine, Vincent pulled back and walked through the kitchen and towards the dining room, glancing around the empty room as though he were expecting some person to leap out and surprise him from somewhere, though through his hallucinations something akin to that had happened before. One could never tell when it came to insomnia, because when someone is as tired as he was consistently, it had been hard to tell the difference between dream and reality.

What had been even worse was the reflection that he had seen in the glass doorway that opened to the patio, that silver flash that seemed like a manikin standing where Vincent should have been. He blinked just once before the image had shimmered and vanished from sight. Although he thought that it might've been him just then, Vincent for once had been truly doubting the effects of his insomnia. A few seconds passed while he stood there in the center of the dining room before the image had returned once more, and this time it appeared as though a man was standing outside his door, watching him from outside, gazing inside and in a way it was beckoning to be let in.

But Vincent just took a gulp of his coffee before he decided to ignore the image. It had to have just been an image on the back of his mind, reflecting into his eyes to make it appear as though it were real, but in reality the only thing that was there was a wistful wind and neon lights, glimmering upon the thickness of the glass. All he did was turn his back to avoid the reflection of the yellow-eyed man who appeared to have been standing outside his door.

Closing his eyes as he fell down onto the couch, Vincent swiftly set down his mug onto the table that stood beside the sofa, sighing and closing his eyes as he ran a hand over his face. He could feel the calluses over his palms; the thickening sensation of flesh running across his forehead as he peered through his fingers and gazed upward towards the ceiling. The edges of the fan managed to sweep its way into the heat of the atmosphere, scraping away the burning sensation and replacing it with a cool breeze that was brought back down to him from where he'd lain. And as time passed, the glisten in the distance hadn't ceased to vanish like his other illusions, which after a while had, needless to say, became rather disconcerting.

It would be hours before the sun would kiss the heavens again, to diminish the moon and push away the stars from urbane eyes once more, not that Vincent was complaining. Often the sun had brought peace to the decaying paranoia that the night had brought upon him; having to watch his back, walking through the darkness without being able to see what was ahead. Although he'd become less conscious over his own self than he had been two hundred years ago, when Eyrie was still alive.

There were, of course, several perks as well as burdens to the reality that one cannot die, and it was called immortality, and with that came the pain of loss as well. In the end, people die, and while the time passes, all one can do is watch. No way to stop the clock from ticking, or the train from moving on the tracks, or the way the world all turned. It would forever rotate itself around in a forever dream varied with actuality, something that was hard to deal with when one were to become attached to a certain someone...knowing well that the day would come when they would grow old, and then wither away. Perhaps that way the reason why Death Children were not meant to love. Vincent had come to understand what they had meant by that after a while, but before he could have complied, both him as well as Ravine, it had been too late. However, that was one thing that Ravine had better than him, that she did not have to watch her lover die, and yet she had turned her back because her half-heart had taken itself to another extreme. She could no longer control her emotions.

But things had changed over the years, and by now Vincent was curious as to what Ravine was like now, how she was doing and if she'd finally mended what had been broken or if she was back to her regular, old self. Not the girl that he'd known when he first met her, but the Ravine that he'd seen, standing in the midst of bodies and a bloodied corridor that should have been painted white. It hadn't been so much that the blood had disturbed him and Eyrie at the time, but it had been the fierce look in her narrowed eyes just then, a beast's glare that had almost convinced him that she was going to go after the two of them next. At the time, he actually wanted to run away from her before they were caught in her snare; not for the sake of himself, but for Eyrie, who was in more danger than himself.

He remembered the way things had gone the way they had back then. How could he had forgotten? It was like a tape recorder replaying itself over and over again, taunting him with a flicking claw, ready to lash down his throat and tear it out so that he couldn't scream. He wanted to run away from that side of him, just to forget...and yet, another part of Vincent said that he didn't truly want to forget what all had happened, but to look back and see it moreover as a lesson; that strangely enough, he would have to accept that the Nyne were correct in their conception as to not allowing their Death Children to fall into any sort of emotional situation. It made them weaker. And by the gods, Vincent had never thought that he could have felt weaker being haunted by this.

Strangely enough, he felt himself laugh. Vincent hadn't heard anything like that for the longest time--his laugh. It sounded strange; this reverberation down his throat that almost felt painful, but in a way it was right to him. He remembered the way Eyrie used to smile when he laughed, because she would be doing so with him, or most of the time at least. She was happy to see him, not as nonchalant as Orpheus and Kaligar were. How casual they were whenever they saw him, like they were bored now, it was aggravating. But then again, he wasn't the real Death Child, of course. Just like Ravine, he, too, was also a mistake. Had he felt anything for this like one should have? None whatsoever. No anger, frustration, or anything; after a while Vincent had actually come to accept the actuality that his existence was an error. To the Nyne, he was just a replacement for Ravine's disappearance, seeing that to them he was truly not a vital part to the prophecy that had been triggered so many years ago.... It had been Ravine, of course, who was meant to take part in the prophecy, yet it had also been her who ran from it, leaving Vincent to deal with it instead.

About an hour had passed just then while Vincent sat in contemplation, his thoughts being the one thing that kept him from drifting in the conscious realm. When one had too many words hovering over their head it tends to be a bit of a hinder from being capable to relax, in which case he wasn't going to be sleeping for quite some time now, or so it appeared. But his heart was suddenly jerked, which had brought a jolt into his body that awakened his prone and restless form.

There had been a tapping on the glass, where Vincent had seen the man standing outside the patio. By now he could see the darkened horizon and the city in the distance, the neon lights outlining the image of the man so that only his yellow eyes were the only coloration that was visible from their distance. The eerie sight had caught Vincent's gaze and caused him to jump onto his feet, staring back at the man who he could have sworn he had known already before, but in a way he seemed almost atypical to the point where Vincent couldn't place his finger on it; and yet it had been because of his alienated appearance that had been the one thing that caught his eye, his memory, into remembering.

His cloak was draped over one side of his shoulder, whilst the other clung to the other side of his shoulder like a pair of claws grappling his black shirt. But it hadn't been so much as the attire that had caught Vincent's eye and jolted his memory into its supreme form, the pictures of the past abruptly taking him towards the present, and it had been only Grayson's eyes that had done that to him.

Naturally the Death Children had gold eyes, like Ravine, Vincent only had specs of gold because he wasn't what one could call a Death Child, because in truth he wasn't really, he was more of an imitation, since there had never been any known male Death Children to have ever existed anyway. The golden eyes was a representation of the gateway, the opening between worlds that would open between the contemporary timeline and the one which would only a Death Child can open and pass through. However, seeing that Grayson was male and neither a Death Child, his eyes could only have been yellow for the simple fact that he had died once before, by the hands of Ravine herself, only to have been revived by a Nyne and given a mission. With that, he became something that was similar to a Death Child, only of a lesser being, yet the only thing that made him one up from a lower level organism was that he had been killed by the hands of a Death Child, hence giving him he ability to enter her mind whenever he pleased. He could torment her, haunt her, be everywhere she was at if he wanted to, and there wasn't a damn thing that she could do about it, because whenever he was killed, she would feel his physical anguish. One of the many shortcomings about being the creatures that him, Ravine, and Grayson all were.

Grayson was a Lamb. He was sacrificed by Ravine, but given a new life; an eternal life, and one that he'd chosen to spend following Ravine, being the only one who could have given her the kind of jolt that he had felt that she needed in order to grab her power ego and bring her back down. If it weren't for him, Ravine would have been close to what one would consider a god, and in many ways he was her control, which made it one of the many reasons why the Nyne hadn't had Grayson erased. It was sickening in general that he held her by a loose string, and wherever she went he would find her. Vincent didn't like it when his sister was messed with in such a way, or anyone else that he'd cared for, and given the simple reality that there wasn't anything he could do about it made the reality even worse.

Not knowing for what reason he'd done so, Vincent sighed in defeat when he'd turned and walked towards the glass door, staring back at Grayson who had this vacant look upon his face--as he always had. It wasn't like he had much to fear over his life, for if Grayson wished to kill him, then there would be not much of a fight, either way it would just be a fruitless battle because he would have been wasting his time.

As Grayson brushed the front of his cloak off, running his fingers through his white hair and looking up at the ceiling, his gaze following the fan that continuously circled around the area, Vincent shut the glass and turned to his visitor, crossing his arms as he scanned Grayson as though suspecting that at any given instant he would simple withdraw his weapon and strike. But he didn't do that. As a matter in fact, they stood there in silence while Grayson gazed up at the fan, unmoving.

"You know where she is, don't you?" Vincent asked, almost accusingly, both of them holding the knowledge as to whom he had been speaking of. Grayson wasn't thick, he had a clue, and with that feat he had been capable of picking up the indirect implications. When he turned back to Grayson, he had still been standing in silence, and that had been the one thing that had angered Vincent the most, was whenever he'd pull something like this--he knew Grayson was aware of Ravine's current whereabouts, and that was the whole reason why he allowed him to come inside his own home.

With that, Grayson slowly nodded. "Yes, I do know."

Finally he was getting somewhere with this. His gaze shifted towards the corner of his eye, glancing at Grayson skeptically anyway, both of them were aware as to how much trust Grayson deserved, and it wasn't much. The trick was to be nonchalant, and in order to do that Vincent would have to take his frustration out on something else after Grayson was done and gone. "Where is she?"

"The question that is needed to be asked here is, where is she headed." The edge of Grayson's lip twitched into a tiny smirk--the kind that was enough to make Vincent fight the urge to turn and slam his fist into the man's jaw. Must hold that back. The frustration of his insomnia was something that he shouldn't allow to get to him, seeing that Grayson was the only way in finding out where Ravine was, or where she was headed, in which it appeared that was where he was leading him off to.

Vincent sighed. "Where is she going?"

"That I do not know." He turned his head gradually to Vincent with a smirk. "I was hoping that you would have been the one to tell me that. She seems like she wants to go somewhere, and she wants to get there fast. She's taken a civilian with her; a mortal."

Blinking, Vincent now appeared taken aback by this newly received information. Ravine wasn't the kind of person he could see just picking up any old sort of hitchhiker from the side of the street. "I can only tell where she is currently at, and it appears that she is moving a little further north. Why she is keeping herself out of reach from you all should have been obvious from the very start, so don't give me that stupid, confused look."

Quickly Vincent snapped his mouth shut. "So what do you suggest?"

Bringing his arm up and brushing off the cuffs to his gloves, Grayson looked idly at his hand after he flexed his fingers. "I was hoping that you would have some sort of means of transportation so that we could catch up to her faster. She actually came by this town a couple days ago, and I've been following her from thereafter. The girl is out there somewhere, though, so the only way to be sure that she's not going to ruin anything for the Nyne is to keep a close eye on what she is doing, exactly."

"So what're you suggesting? That I go and follow her?"

"No. I don't ask other people to do my work, which is exactly why I came here to get you. There are some things that will come down the road, and I will be needing your aid." Grayson smiled a little, tilting his head in a way that as he turned and started to walk towards the exit. Vincent would have enjoyed nothing more than tackling him while his back remained turned, but alas, that wouldn't have been a very dignified battle. Not to mention masochists weren't much fun to fight against.

Vincent's face screwed angrily a little as he looked away. "So now what?"

As he had been passing the door, Grayson reached into the closet across from the foyer he stood within, reaching through the closet and pulling out a duffle bag that he took by the handle and tossed it across the room, enough to Vincent to catch and nearly topple over with the velocity that Grayson had added into it. He grinned as though he were biting a bullet. "We're going to be taking off the instant you get packed."

Vincent stared, bemused. "How long will we be gone?"

"A while." Grayson's grin grew.

He sighed, almost furiously, as he turned and moved through the kitchen and to his room where he'd commenced gathering his things. That morning, as the sun started to reach into the sky and fulfilling its presence with a multicolor blast, Vincent had thrown his bag over his shoulder, glancing at Grayson out of the corner of his eye and saw that he'd been strangely chipper about the whole idea of the trip. His eyebrow twitched a little as he loaded his things into his jeep, Grayson leaping into the passenger's seat, while Vincent had driven the two of them off into the desert, muttering under his breath.