#vivi's movement's fast and calculated

[nights-at-crystarium]

wolqotd

Your WoL fights a random enemy, a random npc/civilian happens to witness that. How would they describe the encounter?

[lovingmyselfcore]

Chapter III; You Ever Just Shoot Yourself? No? Me either...

Is this even good?? Not feeling very confident about this, it always seems better in my head

“Jude! How are you feeling?” Lilliver’s voice was way too loud for so early in the morning.

I’d just arrived, after a lovely morning filled with throwing up, Vivi’s barely contained laughter and voicemails from Madoc yelling at me to show up at work.

I threw myself down next to Garett on the couch and glared at her, “This is your fault.” I pointed a finger at her and glared.

Van snorted, “You’re the one who decided to get that drunk. We had nothing to do with that.”

“She invited me out, ergo, she is to blame.”

“That makes sense,” Garett said sarcastically and I turned my glare on him, a jolt of satisfaction running through me when he actually edged away with his hands raised in defense.

“So,” Van started, his eyes gleaming with laughter, “Baby Greenbriar was the one who brought you home, huh?”

I rolled my eyes, “Yeah, Cardan drove me home.”

“Anything you want to share with the class?” I didn’t like his tone at all.

“What is that supposed to mean?”

“You said that you two despise each other?” Lilliver reminded me, sitting down on my other side.

“We do.” I said with a snarl, “I wouldn’t be all that broken up about it if I never have to see him again.”

None of them responded and I felt like I had to justify myself. “I didn’t ask for him to drive me home.”

Garrett opened his mouth but was interrupted when Lilliver’s phone rang.

“It’s Dain.” She said, hurrying to answer it.

Garrett, Van, and I all went stiff, watching her face as she answered. Despite her sitting right next to me I couldn’t hear Dain, only her occasional yes, or no sirs.

When she hung up she met Van’s eyes before looking at Garett, avoiding me entirely. “He wants her in it.”

Van leaned forward, brows furrowed. “She’s so new.”

“I know.”

“How much does he want us to tell her?” Garrett asked.

The three of them were acting like I wasn’t there and, honestly, it was pissing me off.

I moved to ask what exactly it was when Lilliver spoke again, “We’re not telling her anything. He is.”

~~~

“Is anybody going to tell me what the hell is happening?”

I felt like I’d been asking that question for hours, despite Dain’s call only being 10 minutes ago. It didn't help that none of them were answering me.

Their silence was making me nervous, what was it I was about to be 'in'? The Greenbriar's were a family of narcissistic, rich air-heads but here were Garrett, Van, and Lilliver acting like I was about to find out they needed a new hitwoman, it was unsettling.

I was still sitting on the couch, at Garrett and Lilliver's insistence. They'd left to accompany Dain from the Greenbriar mansion to where we were meeting to talk. Van and I were the only two left in the trailer, and he was pacing the length of the tiny room. He looked worried.

As I opened my mouth to question this entire situation again he halted, turning to face me and raising a hand to quiet me.

"Look, Jude," Van said finally, taking pity on me. "I know you think the Greenbriar's are all shallow and mindless, but there is so much you don't know about them." I felt annoyance shoot through me, he was acting like I was some stupid child. "How they got so much power and money. How so unlike the personas they display on the show are from the calculating creatures underneath. They got their power, Jude." He held out a hand to help me up. I didn't take it.

He moved towards the door and before he opened it he spoke so quietly I strained to hear him.

"You're about to learn what they do to keep it."

The room suddenly became twenty degrees cooler.

~~~~

Van and I arrived before Dain and the others did. 

It was a small house, only a few miles from the trailers and hidden behind a small forest. I wondered what was taking them so long to get here as Van swung the door open.

My first thought was how weird this was. A three-room house. The main room, the one we were currently in, a table with chairs, a singular bookcase filled with bins and containers, and no real signs of life aside from the barren kitchen tucked in a corner. The next room was curtained off. The third room was a tiny bathroom.

Van closed the door behind me and sat heavily in one of the chairs. He looked at me when I made no movement and gestured to the chair next to him.

"Sit." A dry laugh, "Stay awhile."

"Van," I said quietly, my voice still echoing in the room. "What is this place."

He sighed, "The 'war room'." The what? "We have all our meetings with Dain here."

"Why not just at the trailers? Or the mansion? Or literally anywhere else?" 

He met my eyes, voice so serious it startled me. "Anybody could be listening there."

What. The. Fuck. This is insanity. Van was acting like these were secrets worth more than my life. Like the Greenbriar's were harboring some kind of dark and even deadly secret.

The door opened and Van stood up, bowing his head as Dain entered. 

“Sir,” Van said, motioning to an empty chair. Dain sat, his eyes never leaving me.

His gaze made me feel gross like it was coating my skin in a layer of filth I couldn't get rid of.

Lilliver and Garrett sat down, Lilliver shooting me an encouraging look, Garrett not looking at me at all.

"I heard you're a clever liar, Jude."

I raised my eyebrows, meeting his probing gaze, "Am I?"

"You're good at fighting?"

"Why don't you find out?"

Lilliver, Van, and Garrett all looked at me, their eyes open wide.

Dain's voice got dangerously low, "Don't talk to me like that. It won't end well for you. I promise."

Van's hand wrapped around my upper arm, forcing me to break Dain's gaze.

"What do you about them?" Dain asked, gesturing to the three of them.

I didn't know what to say. His tone told me that whatever I said would not be the right answer. That I wasn't going to impress him.

"I don't know exactly what they do for you," I ceded. I hated giving him that but it seemed like the only right answer.

"What they do for me?" He leaned forward, towards me. "They do whatever I tell them to. You do whatever I tell you to, isn't that right."

I stiffened, "I don't know what you're talking about."

He grinned, "It's not that hard to understand. You do whatever I want, whenever I want. And you never question me. Understood?" 

I didn't respond and he lunged across the table, grabbing my arm and squeezing tight enough to bruise. "If you repeat anything that is said in this room, to anybody, ever-" He trailed off, tightening his grip.

I nodded, it was the only thing I could do. I was sure I could fight him, but from the way Dain had been acting with the others, I doubted they would fight on my side.

  He released my arm, leaning back, reclining in the chair in a way that reminded me too much of Cardan.

"I need you to do something for me. But first, I suppose you need to know some background."

Lilliver looked to Dain, once he nodded she spoke, "We do anything to help Dain. With anything."

"Our main objective is to allow him to keep his power within the family," Van said.

"There are a lot of things happening within my family that are not within the public eye," Dain said, eyes scrutinizing every move I made in my seat. "My father is sick." I raised my eyebrows, Eldred hadn't seemed sick every time I'd seen him. Granted, it was only on the show, I haven't seen him in person in a long time.

"Which means the Greenbriar's are all out for each other." Garrett said, "We are fighting to be sure Dain comes out on top of that fight."

I furrowed my eyebrows and held my hands up, "What do you gain in you 'come out on top'?"

"My family has their fingers in a lot of different pies," Dain said, "A lot of power in a lot of different communities. A lot of connections, and a lot of dirty money." He raised his eyebrows like he knew I understood what exactly he meant.

"From what?" I asked, not sure I wanted to know. 

Dain shrugged casually, "Blackmail, the occasional 'disappearance', drugs and the like."

I froze. I'd assumed as much but I still didn't like the sound of 'occasional disappearance'. “No,” I said, standing. “No, I’m out. This is insane.” I gestured to them, “You are all insane and I’m leaving. Find someone else to do your dirty work.” I spat at Dain. “If you even need one. You’ve got three people who for some reason are wrapped around your finger.”

I walked towards the door when an arm shot out and stopped me. I whirled, attempting to knock Garrett’s feet out from under him. He lept back bringing an arm up to deflect my punch. We fought for what must have been only a minute before Van and Lilliver helped him wrangle me. 

My struggle was futile, they had me pinned.

Dain strode forward, unaffected as ever. He stuck two fingers under my chin pulling my head up. He scanned my face before purring, “Feisty,”

I resisted the urge to spit at him. With Lilliver, Garrett and Van undoubtedly all armed and definitely willing to take me down if Dain even raised a finger, that wouldn’t end well for me.

“Do you care about your family, Jude?” He asked. “What are their names again?”

He dropped my chin and went to sit back down. They forced me back into my chair before Garrett and Lilliver sat down themselves, Van was at my back, ready to tackle me if so much as blinked wrong in Dain’s direction.

He held up his hands as if he had counted to ten, “Madoc and Oriana.” He put two fingers down. “Vivienne and her girlfriend. Heather right?” Two more fingers. How did he know- “Your weaker other half, Taryn, of course.” Another finger. Cue a low growl at me. “And that adorable little brother of yours. Oak. Imagine what I could have done to them if you decide to tell anybody what happened here. Imagine it, Jude.” I saw red, shooting forward in my seat. 

I wasn’t fast enough, Van reached out and caught me, tugging me forcefully back against the chair. I struggled against him until a click. It was quiet, but there was no mistaking it.

I leaned back a little more and my suspicions were confirmed. This absolute motherfucker had pulled a gun on me.

Dain grinned, “So, Jude. Tell me. What are you going to do? It doesn’t seem to me like you have very many options.”

~~~~~~

"The biggest threat to Dain is Balekin." Van had sat down, leaving me alone in my seat. Dain had instructed him to leave it on the table and he’d done so. Resting his hand on top of it. Right in my line of sight, where I couldn’t forget about it. Not like I’d forget even if he put it away.

Lilliver was talking now as if what had just happened was just a fever dream. They were explaining to me more what was happening. Not like it was really helping.

His lip curled in distaste, "Elowyn is my father's not-so-secret favorite as I'm sure you know." I nodded. "But she doesn't want it. None of my sisters do, for their own individual reasons. But, Balekin wants it."

They didn't even mention Cardan.

This was insane. There was no way they did what my wild imagination was acting like they do. I'm being dramatic. This isn’t really happening.

"Prove yourself," Dain said suddenly.

The intensity in his tone startled me, "What?"

"You know things now. But I want you to prove you aren't going to run to any of my family and tattle." He stood up and walked around the table until he was towering directly above me. "Would you kill for me, Jude?" His voice was soft.

I didn't answer. How the hell was I supposed to answer. Well, I knew what he wanted me to say.

"I don't think there's anyone for her to kill right now, sir." Lilliver's was an angel. A perfect angel trying to save me from whatever was going to happen if she hadn't. Dain and I both looked at her.

He sighed, very dramatically, and Jude was reminded again that he was Cardan's brother.

"I suppose you're right." Suddenly he held his hand out. “Give me that gun.”

"Sir?" He asked. Van and Lilliver looked just as confused but he didn't respond.

Garrett pulled a gun out of his pocket and I edged away as Dain flicked the safety off.

He motioned for me to take it, "Shoot yourself."

"What?" Van asked. Lilliver made a distressed choking noise.

I evaluated him and the situation. The soft sunlight filtering in through the small window above the kitchen, reflecting off Dain's golden hair. He was haloed, almost like an angel. An angel with his own cadre of spies against his own family, who have undoubtedly done unspeakable things for him. An angel holding out a gun and instructing me to shoot myself with a bored expression. 

I stood up, he was taller than me but I stretched until I could almost meet him. He wasn't kidding. He wanted me to shoot myself, and I had a sinking feeling that was the least of what was going to happen to me. What I was going to do.

I took the gun, bouncing it in my hand, getting a feel for it. "Where?"

His eyes flashed with what, if I didn't know better, might have been admiration. “Your arm will be fine.”

I held the gun up, pointing it at my opposite arm. What. The. Fuck. Was I doing? This is insanity, that was all I could think about, it was running through my brain on loop.

Then I squeezed.

The shot echoed, bouncing around like a scream in a canyon. I don’t know if I screamed, I don’t know how they reacted initially. I do know, however, that to this day, in a small cabin tucked away from everyone there’s a bloodstain on the floor, right under a thick oak table. A girl died there. A girl whose biggest concern was fighting her adopted father about having to be in the same room as her high school nemesis. A girl that wasn’t going to come back.

Lilliver was holding a cloth against my arm, muttering something to herself. I refused to blackout. That would be showing too much weakness.

We were on the floor of the cabin. They were crouched over me. I had no idea where Dain had gone, and even though I should, I didn’t really care.

“You’ll be fine, Jude. I know how to take care of a gunshot wound.” Despite what had happened today, I didn’t fight her. I didn’t trust her. But I didn’t fight her.

“You did good. You did good.” Garrett’s voice was almost indistinguishable from the rush in my head.

My ears were filled with water that was soaking into my brain. It was going to come bubbling out of my mouth, my nose. I was going to drown within my own body.

Van’s hand wrapped around mine. “Welcome to the Shadows.”

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