(I do not play Valentino Pilate. This is a log played out with the mun Lynn and I am using it to explain the background of how Solomon has come to be in New Orleans.)
SOLOMON :The gun felt good in his hand. In fact it felt more real than anything else in that moment. Everything else was sort of fuzzy. It could be the booze, or the fact that he hadn't eaten in days, or just the sheer level of his anger. He'd never liked vampires, but now that lifelong hatred burned inside him. Fingers gripped the handle of the gun as he moved through the exterior landscaping of the home. There were lots of clipped bushes beneath the windows. Bushes, ha! Landscaping undead bastard. Solomon was trying to look through the windows, to see if what Nori said was true. He refused to believe that Lylianna would be there without some kind of undead trickery on the fangers part. Carefully he tested one of the windows, fingertips touching the metal and finding it hot. Little did he know that his anger was rising the level of those latent powers in him. Jiggling one of the windows he had finally had enough. Gritting his teeth he punched one of the panes of glass and with a shattering sound it burst in. Reaching through he felt the thick shards of glass cut up the length of his forearm, blood welled to the surface and flooded in crimson lines down his fair skin. Reaching up he fiddled with the lock, but fingers slick with blood made it hard to get a grip. Then at last he flipped the latch and pulled his arm back out so he could push up the window. All sense was gone and any thoughts of self preservation had left him. She was there, he could feel it, and if that bastard had done anything to her....oh who was he kidding. Like a fucking vampire could help it. Climbing through the window his blood dripped into the extravagant carpet. The surroundings were no doubt lush and gorgeous, but he didn't notice because the whole world had narrowed to a poisoned tip in his mind. Gun still shoved in the pocket of his coat, his unbloodied hand still gripping it as he moved on into the house. (end)
TINO : Valentino had not heard from Llidya to find out how much longer Lylianna was going to be staying with him. Not like he minded. She proved to be quite entertaining when they were around each other, actually getting the old cod to laugh. She had told him about the necklace she had made her friend, a part of the ruby that she had hidden in his home, to keep it safe. Little did he know that her friend was out to kill him. Then again, who wasn't? He might think his life was abnormal if someone wasn't trying to get rid of him or hated him. It was an everyday thing for the Primogen. The sound of shattered glass caught his attention though. It was in the sitting room. He moved with quiet ease through his home, out from his study and towards the scent of blood. It was fresh, and laced with something different. Hearing footsteps on the carpet, he paused just inside the darkness of the hallway to watch the intruder venture further into the depths of his home. His voice was velveteen soft as he spoke, "May I help you?" His power radiated from him like a hot summers day, angered that some fool would dare enter his home like a common thief. Square jaw clenched as silver eyes blazed with untold fury from the blackness of the hallway. -d
SOLOMON : At the sound of that disgusting voice Solomon turned and stared down the dark hall towards Tino. Anger and hate filled the young man until it was almost sure to boil over. Power coiled around him heating his skin and all the while he remained ignorant of it. Mainly because he wanted to be. Nope, Solomon didn't want to be one of those fucking monsters. "What did you do to her you bastard?" His thumb flipped back the safety on the gun with a click as he drew it from the pocket of his jacket. The metal gleamed even in the faint light, but in his anger he wasn't trying to hide. "What did you do to Lylianna?" That heavily accented Aussie voice was slightly guttural from too many cigarettes and too much booze in the last few days, and all that showed in his appearance. Eyes were rimmed with puffy red lids, and his face was darkened by what very nearly passed as a beard. Raising the gun he pointed it down the hallway at the man, aiming for his heart. Though Solomon very much doubted some fanger asshole could possibly have a heart. (end)
TINO : Tino registered no emotion other than that tell tale scent of anger that this boy was acting like a fool over... Lylianna? Head canted as he stared at the boy who drew a measly gun and pointed it at him. Hissing with a show of fangs towards the male, he stepped towards him. "I have done nothing to Lilyana, maschio. Nothing more than what her guardian asked of me to do. You are a fool to come in here and think you are going to harm me." His chest was now level with the gun, his hand moving withlightning speed to grab the barrel and place it over his shoulder, away from any vital organs, not a fool. If the idiot was going to shoot him, he did not need his heart split in two. Eyes narrowed as he met the man's gaze, feeling that heat radiate off of him, enough to make Valentino break out in an actual sweat. It was triggering his self protection mechanism, his own power rising around him. "I do not know what you have been told, but I do not appreciate your rudeness in coming into my home. Perhaps you should have asked Liliyana what I am to her. I do not hide her or hold her prisoner." -d
SOLOMON :"Fuck you." When Tino grabbed the gun so fast and moved it putting the two of them closer together Solomon made a hacking sound in the back of his throat and spat a giant phlegm gobber at the vampires face. It made a satisfying splatting noise when it hit him and that liquid burned with heat. "LIAR!" He just couldn't believe Lylianna would consort with a fanger. As he screamed that word power uncurled from him in a blast like furnace flames blanching out. It had only happened one time before and then it had thrown Mary Jane across a room. For him it was unintentional, something that was a response to the power he felt around him. A defense mechanism. That blast would rocket out of him with the yell of defiance. When the power hit the man and his grip on the gun loosened Solomon jerked the gun back and took a shot at Tino. The crack of the gunshot was so loud it was deafening in the hallway, but by then Solomon was so far out of control he couldn't aim properly and the shot would only take the man in the arm or shoulder, somewhere non-vital. Damaging with silver bullets, but nothing that was a kill shot. (end)
TINO : He felt that heat surge and slam into him, already pissed by the near acid burning spit on his face. Great, he was going to look sun burned now. When that power slammed into him, he growled in pain as he flew back, slamming into the wall just opposite of Solomon, his white shirt singed, the hair on his chest burned, the smell of burning flesh making him gag. Then he realized it was his own as a bullet tore through his shoulder. Milliseconds. All of this in milliseconds. That icy power wrapped around him, blue flames appearing out of nowhere as he moved quickly, towards Solomon. It took everything in him not to kill the male in that moment. Every fiber in him screamed for him to just kill the fool, but something about him, something screamed that he was a part of Liliyana, and he would do nothing to hurt that child. She was someone who did not look down at him, accepted him for all his faults. A real friend. Fingers grabbed the gun and yanked it out of the man’s hand, tossing it aside as free hand slammed him into the wall, spidering the dry wall behind him, fangs bared as eyes of a feral beast stared him down. "You are lucky you know Liliyana, or I would kill you without second thought." -d
SOLOMON :Something was happening to him, he didn't know what it was. Normally that was exactly the kind of thing he hated, the kind of thing he wanted nothing to do with. He'd spent his whole life unknowingly trying to convince himself that he wasn't a monster. All the while not seeing that his work with Humans First, all the anger and rage, made him more a monster than any undead being. Pure blossoms of red fire ate along his skin. It flared into the room like white light but he could feel no burn. Hands grabbed him and he felt his back slam into the wall, there was a cracking sound, possibly his spinal cord breaking, but he couldn't think clearly. Reaching out he dug his hand on instinct into the bullet wound in Tino's shoulder and that white hot flame burst through the wound, digging deep and searing the man’s body with a pain so pure and pristine it left the mind with no other choice but to scream. Yet Solomon didn't know what these powers were. Didn't even know who he really was. Even as that pain made Tino scream he was healing him. Healing him with the purity of fire. The silver bullet inside that would fester at the undead skin was being broken down by the flames, purified and removed. The wound was healing itself as it burned. For deep beneath the human rage and pain was a power so pure and crystalline that it's only purpose could be to save. Though its bearer didn't know what he was doing. (end)
TINO : Tino did scream. He screamed so loud the windows shattered around them as the white hot pain seared his flesh, pushing out that blue ice cold flame to envelope Solomon, forcing him to match Tino's screams as the flames melded into something he had never experienced before. The flames and power were melding and colliding all and once, causing an explosion of power and a unique, unexplainable flame to backflash out, throwing Tino once more away from Solomon, knocking him into a wall, splintering the plaster and cracking his head open from the sheer force of the explosion and hit into the wall. Fevered, out of focus eyes tried to see where the male was, but he looked unconscious, broken on the floor, feet away from him. Tino groaned as he tried to move, to try and finish what was started, but he was hurting. It looked as if the male was breathing, the power was gone, but there was tendrils of smoke rising from his flesh. He had to get up and move the boy. -d
SOLOMON :Screaming. That was what the world had become. An endless vortex of pain and fire and screams. The light in the room was so blinding that he couldn't see. Like staring too long into the sun his retinas seemed to black out. Blue-black flames from the vampire mingled with his own intense white fire. Both powers burst open like a myriad of energy that swept over him. Tino was gone, no longer holding him, but that didn't matter anymore. In his mind life flashed before his eyes in a sequence so fast that he couldn’t take it all at once. Daylight in ancient Egypt, the chanting of priests and the flames of a funeral pyre. Time without end and the centuries passed beneath him. Life after life, from early Mesopotamia through his birth in Australia in the modern era. The full span of the phoenix life soared through him and he felt his soul grow so intoxicated that it might burst from his skin. It was only in that last moment that he understood, what and who he was, and why he had been born. He would be gone soon, and no one on Earth, not even he, had known who he truly was. That light was all around him now and his body levitated above the ground, suspended just as Tino had held him. Pale skin was crystallized with sparking blue white fire, it coated him, glistened against his skin like it would eat him alive. There was a sad beauty to that moment. A second of such heavenly loveliness, and yet sad because there was no one there to see it. Then the darkness came, the flames died on his flesh, and Solomon’s body fell to the ground. A shell, empty and forsaken. Lying among the debris he looked strangely at peace in that comatose slumber. Deep within the skin of his body the phoenix was alive, it cried to the sun, cried for its human body now left a wasted vessel. Sleep. The sleep of the eternal found him, and washed his conscious mind away before he could even speak a final word. (end)
TINO : It was beauty indeed. He had never seen anything like it, except once. Once when he swore he saw an angel. An angel that came to Christ as he died. It was something Tino never spoke about. Ever. He winced as he got up, looking over his singed, yet healed body. He prayed in that moment, that he never, ever, would experience anything like that again. Not even a scar on him. He moved gingerly as he tested out his body, shaking his head at it all. At that moment, he wished he never laid eyes on Liliyana. He'd kill the man in his comatose slumber. Slice and dice, maim, whatever pleased him. But was that really what Tino was about? No, he never dirtied his hands. Unless he had too. Instead, an idea formed in his head. Carefully picking up the male, he carried him into the underground passages, where he held vampires prisoner who dare go against his laws. There was something there. Something tingling inside of him that he wasn't sure of. It was like an itch that he couldn't scratch. shaking it off, he made his way down into the bowls of the manse, motion sensored lights illuminating the way for him. Once into the cavern, there lay a dozen coffins in various sizes and shapes. But one stood out above them all. A glass coffin. Gently laying Soloman inside, he closed the lid, leaving a segment open for air. Now all he had to do was figure out how to break this all to Liliyana. A shiver tore down the back of his spine, power tingling along his finger tips as he exhaled slowly, confusion riddled expression as he gazed at the male laying there so peaceful. What had this man done to him? Something wasn't right..... -d
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After that day Solomon remained in the glass coffin under the care of Valentino Pilate. Eventually the vampire sent the coffin to his old homestead in New Orleans where it rested in an underground room, the glass lid covered over with dust, the man inside a nearly forgotten spirit. But Solomon Durham was not dead. In fact in some ways he had probably never been quite so alive. If only his body would get with the program. His soul hovered and awaited the coming of Isis, the kiss of life, to bring him back from the enchanted sleep his awakening had caused, and somewhere deep inside him he could feel the connection to his bonded.
That soft binding chord hummed between them and stretched taut over the space that separated them. Phoenix song rose and fell on the ethereal plane as his mystic soul cried out with longing for the one he had lost. Lylianna.....her name perched like a feathered thing inside his soul. In his dreams she haunted him with her loveliness and the purity of her spirit. There was so much he had done that needed to be atoned for both for himself and for the woman he adored. The past stretched out for him like an open book and he could see the lines of his many lifetimes and the trespasses committed on this recent go around.
The phoenix felt his pain and sang to its brethren worlds away. It tried to call them to wake him, but years would pass and no one came. Locked in darkness he was lost. A lost soul in the home of a dead man. Time ticked on and with it the last years of his life continued to fade. How long before time would run out?
-- Edited by JESSICA MCFARLAND on Thursday 15th of March 2012 08:28:02 PM
Detective Marks was well pass him prime. His once athletic body had given into that soft body of a man who had one to many hungry man dinners and scotch on the rocks with the boys after work. His hair was thinning in the back as if it had been well worn from years rubbing the back of his head. He was a example of a man who played good cop for to long...Especially when you were playing with some of the crescent city's dirtiest in the 8 th district of New Orleans. And now after years of service to the city he almost gave his life for...They put him playing babysitter to a half blind (or so he and everyone else believed at the station) nun from Rome as she played super hero for every abused child in the ninth ward.
"You went to far Sister. You broke the protocol....Sister Behr..Are you even listening to me?"
Eva was...But not enough to care about the poor detective's huffing and puffin. She watched him from behind her glasses as he paced back and forth in his small office. A small smirk would curve over her lips. Why she had decided to play Saint Eva gather of the abused was beyond her...Maybe they felt like kindred sprites...Maybe because after centuries of living something had never changed. But it wasn't her true reason for this. She was a collector. She found those with a paranormal gift. Especially those with a strong one that was untrained. She had found Serenity for Ishmael. The child had been a raw talent of elemental..Which in the hands of a emotional and abused six year old was a very dangerous thing...After all rumors in the paranormal community blame a powerful, untrained water witch for the floods that hit New Orleans during Katrina. Power like that cant be without a leash..Or they would see the mess of Hawaii happen again. Shaking her head.
"Im sorry det..Dective. I promise I behave in the future. I was walking and heard her cries(Lie but it wasn't like he was a shifter or vampire). I let my emotions get the best of me...But if we are done here..I must return to the church..Its almost time for my daily prayers"
With that she stood. Sure she wasn't a nun. But in a city where the catholic church still has its own pull and its so deeply bred into people that they have twisted it to become part of their curses with Voodoo. Pulling the drab brown shaw closer to herself she left the building..And that's when she felt it. It was as much a pulling feeling..No it was a punch in the gut.Leaving her breathless for a moment visions swirling in her mind of a life cycle long ago. Unsure if the memories were her own or those of another she watched the movie in her mind play.
The pair chased eachother threw the village running between the their mother's skirts. While the mother laughed and hung the laundry. The two were inseperatable. Had it not been for the five year age difference some would of thought of them as twins. Breathlessly they threw themselves into the sweet smelling grass their fingers entwined. As they watched the clouds above dance by as elephants and there grandmothers shoe. even a great dragon.
"Will we always be together?"
The small childish voice of the boy asked as he turned to face his sister. She had always been with him. Always been outsiders of the villiage...But then again your mothers a rumored witch..All you have is eachother..The other children in the villiage were eighter afraid or were told to never go near you. So all the girl would do is smile. As she leaned over and kissed her brothers cheek.
"Of course...Though one day Ill marry...But...You can come with me..Youll be my stable boy when I become Queen."
She would laugh as her brother threw a handful of grass at her. Tumbling in the grass they wrestled and played. Unknowing of the storm that was brewing in the town hall. Of the villiagers that would attack them later that night. Of how they would set their house into flames and drag both brother and sister away.
"Ill find you. No matter how many years it takes."
Tears brimed in her eyes as she tried to catch her breath. How deep was that memory? What set it off. She hadnt thought of her brother since...Well years ago. Those eyes the color of living fire glowed behind her dark glasses. She felt the Isis stirring. Pulling her..And she went..She was still young in these powers..So confused by them most of the time. She walked what felt like forever till she found herself standing before a great plantation house. Something in there called to her..She could feel it...It screamed to her to free it. But no matter how she pushed the gates they wouldn't budge..She even tried hopping the fence..That didn't work. As if the place was warded against all paranormals. Yet it looked abandoned for years.
The grass was over grown and the the hedges that were once shaped into mystic beast were becoming wild. Paint was chipping on the deck. It even looked as if someone had tried to set fire to it by the burnt chard marks. She could feel the pain here..The hopelessness. It was heavy..A life form of itself. But just beyond all that..She could feel it..But most of all there was a large sign that said for sale with one of those horriable pictures of the real estator on it with her family all in stiff stuits.
"ILL FIND YOU."
Echoed in her mind. What was it here that called her? How was she going to break whatever that was preventing her from entering this place. Pullin out her cell phone she would push al this aside. She would dail the number on it..One Nola Sanchez. Not a local by the number. Intresting. May explain the condition of the place. The phone would ring for some time before it went to a cold voice mail.
"Yes Ms Sanchez Im intresting in the Palete Plantation. Perhaps we can set a meeting? "