Sanguis medicus
Doctor Roma Cerise walked into the clinic wearing her low-cut crimson dress with heels and glasses on her face. “What's up on the docket for today?” The brunette behind the counter looked bored, filed her nails, looked up, and said, “We got the usual, nothing too crazy, old lady Gertrude said she’ll be in for her checkup later, and other than sanitizing cuts and maybe the occasional foreign object in a body cavity, it shouldn’t be in it should be the same day in day out like normal” She stood still for a second the mana in the air was heavy and oppressive she looked back to the brunette behind the counter “whos here right now” She looked up from filing her nails “Ooooh right i almost forgot we got a walk in, a couple complaining of nighttime issues” Roma Cerise walked to the backroom among boxes of assorted supplies she hastily stripped off her clothes before putting on a pair of approximately one size too small pants socks and a pair of dress shoes and a button up shirt and covering it all with a labcoat sunglasses still on her face. She walked back out into the hallway, turning to the left past a sign with a cartoon vegetable with giant muscles that said “Veggies make you big and strong like Vegtopher.” She walked past and laughed slightly. It had been there for years, but still scratched a strange place in her mind. She knocked on the door before opening it. A young man sat on the exam table, and a half-elf woman sat on the chair next to it.
She cleared her throat, and while digging through cabinets looking for assorted supplies, she said, “I understand that you’re having nighttime issues, it's nothing to worry about, plenty of men suffer from erecti-” Rosario interrupted her, “Sorry to cut in, but I think your concierge gave you the wrong idea, we arent like that and its not a physical thing i can quantify” Roma turned around and sat down in a small rolling stool in the center of the room whispering under her breath “Im gonna strangle that damn good for nothing receptionist later” she cleared her throat and said awkwardly “well if its not a physical issue what can i help you with then” He said back to her with a concerned look on his face “Some real bad nightmares and visions cant shake them” she pulled a pen to her mouth sharpened canines chewing on the end of it “Color me intrigued then when did they start” Rosario turned to Senarre “Should we tell her the truth ?” Senarre nodded and said, “Normally I wouldn't, but I think it's better if we did.” He exhaled deeply and said, “We were exploring an abandoned castle, probably from the Great War era, when we got separated. I went to a dungeon and got into a fight, got injured.” He rolled up his sleeve to show off the slice on his shoulder, showing a cut made by five jagged claw marks in the process of healing, stitched up. “I remember the fight up to a certain point, but then it got blurry. I have trouble remembering, anyway, after I came to, the thing was dead, and then shortly thereafter I passed out, and the nightmares and visions started too.”
Roma re-adjusted her sunglasses. “What did that to your arm?” He looked at her where her eyes should be behind the glasses and said, “Vampyr.” Roma was taken aback by his statement. She said in a semi-nervous tone of voice, “Are you slayers ?” Rosario looked down. “No, just explorers.” She cleared her throat. “well since you came into contact with a vampyr and were injured lets treat on the side of caution. Can I borrow some of your blood for a test? It's just standard procedure for anything involving a Vampyr,” her tone shifted slightly. “You know, becoming a quote on quote undead would suck, pun variably intended.” Rosario held out his arm “go ahead anything that you think can help because i havent been able to get a good nights sleep in days” he groaned “Except for last night maybe the dreams didnt feel as intense didnt wake up grabbing my chest sweating and crying” Roma scratched her chin “Interesting then, what changed between last night and the previous nights” He pointed towards Senarre “She slept with me” he blushed slightly and fumbled his words “well slept near me not with, you get the idea”
She drew his blood quickly, grabbed the two vials, and walked toward the door to the small exam room. She closed the door and leaned up against the wall, exhaling hard, feeling as if a pressure was removed from her airways. She walked with the two vials carefully clutched in her hand and opened a door with a sign that read “lab.” She entered and reached back to lock the door, sealing it with a resounding click. One of the vials she opened and created a slide with a small amount of its contents, analyzing it under a microscope to no avail. She said under her breath, “Time to do some unconventional experiments.” She took the remains of the vial that was opened, raised it to her lips, and drank it. Her eyes shifted from a hue of unpolished jade to crimson red, her canines sharpened. She stumbled backwards, feeling heat from her mouth and throat like that of a shot of liquor. She coughed and stumbled forward, steadying herself against a counter. She said, “Such purity, I've never felt so much in a single individual.” She wiped her lips with a rag on the counter, regaining her composure, and she walked back towards the exam room.
Are you perchance a high-class mage?” She said to Rosario, he replied, “I didn't use to have nearly as much mana as I feel like I do now, if that's what you mean.” She sat back on the rolling stool. “Have you been training or any other sort of strain on your mana reserve to increase it recently?” He scratched his forehead. “No, not particularly.” Her face shifted, “so setting aside the potential increase in mana reserves and the beginning of some nightmares and visions which would to me sound like some form of post traumatic stress, you should be fine,” he said back to her “I don't have anything that should be traumatic to create the visions and dreams though, and the dreams they feel weird yet familiar like a memory i think, they make me feel like im there and then whenever she appears in my dreams i feel regret fear pain” Roma adjusted her seat slightly “She… Do you see a recurring face in your dreams? Anyone you know, perhaps a family member?” he shook his head. “No, I can see her face, recognize her, but I can't remember her name or what her face actually looks like when I wake up. I just remember she's an elven woman.” Roma was lost in thought, “Could this elven woman be your companion here?” He shook his head, “No, I don't think so,” just as he was about to speak again, a crash was heard from the front of the building. Roma stood up and said, “One second, please.” She stood up and ran out the door. Moments later, a second crash was heard. Senarre stood up and reached into her waistline to pull her weapon. “Let's check it out. She might need help.” Rosario nodded and jumped off the exam table. Senarre stopped him, “Don't have your sword.” She began to reach behind her to pull her second weapon. “I've been working on this watch,” he placed his right hand and his left hand together in front of his body, his eye lighting a purple-red, and pulled his hands apart. A long jagged spike of black glass materialized in the trail his hand left behind. He turned the blade in on itself, gripping it in a reverse state and pulling again, materializing a pseudo-scabbard. Senarre’s face lit up, “That is so fucking cool i need to figure out something like that.” he nodded and said lets go. They opened the door and carefully walked out.
A man with ghostly pale skin and crimson eyes stood staring at Roma. The receptionist lay in a heap on the other side of the room and spoke frantically, “Grigori wants you back at the nest. One of our flock is no longer killed by hunters.” Roma, with her arms crossed in front of her chest and a bored expression on her face, said to the man, “Bite me, I'm not going back to Grigori.” The man exposed a twisted mouth of broken and jagged teeth. “If you don't come back now ill take you back in pieces. He can do whatever he wants with your body until you regenerate.” Still standing there, she said, “Kiss my ass.” The man rushed forward, grabbing her by the neck, “Change of heart, yet little miss independent,” the man said, laughing. She said back to him, struggling for air, “piss off.” She extended out her right arm, causing her nails to sharpen into claw-like appendages, slashing at the man she cut his right eye causing the vision to go dark “Ill just snap you neck here and drag you back to him conscious should be more fun than just taking back a torso and head like last time, he always scolds me for that since you're his favorite plaything” A footstep was heard followed by a bang the man staggered backwards his arm lost function dropping Roma. “damn i thought i hit the head, i must be getting rusty” he turned to look at Senarre the barrel of her gun still smoking. He lunged aggressively towards her. A blade of black stones was brought down on his arm, severing it cleanly at the elbow. Another strike came from a blunt object of black stones, hitting the side of his head, causing him to jump backwards. He inhaled deeply. Roma shouted out, “Cover your ears.” The man began to let out a shrill screech, shattering the glass windows, when suddenly the sound disappeared. Senarre fired her weapon five more times, each shot hitting the man in the chest. He turned and ran out of the building and jumped, covering three stories in a single leap.
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She sucked her teeth and said, “damn i should've aimed for the head.” Roma clambered to her feet, her glasses gone, and her claws retracted, her eyes of unpolished jade met another of matching color. Rosario mimicked the action of sheathing a sword, and the black stone blade and scabbard disappeared. “So which branch? Or what's your real name?” Roma reached up for her glasses and realized they weren't there. “Shit,” she said, followed immediately by “Would you perchance happen to be the clan head ?” Rosario smiled and said, “No, not at all.” Roma let out a sigh of relief. “My name is Carmilla Colmillo Esparza De La Rosa,” Rosario said back to her. “Nice to meet you, then, Auntie,” Senarre said, scratching her head. “I don't understand why you're calling her auntie?” Rosario said back to her, “It's cause she kinda is, her mother is a distant cousin of mine.” Carmilla stopped him. “Did my family, y'know, continue, well after I disappeared?”
He frowned and said, “I can't know for sure, but I'm sure they did, considering they must've had a funeral for you cause there's a grave in the Lorea cemetery with your name on it.” Senarre stopped them both, “So she's Lorea like you?” Rosario turned to her, “Kind of, but not really, she should be a branch family member. The De la Rosas are still kicking about, but the branch that intermarried with the Esparzas died out, so think about it like the branches on a tree, maybe bout 200 years or so back, the Lorea branch families were different, pretty much the original branches were created to distribute the responsibilities of house Lorea they were positions of service granted for service to the house. But anyway. Back then, the head of the house had a set of triplets. If I remember the branches correctly, the oldest held the main name, and the other two were married into the branches. Granted, they weren't really branch families yet at that point, but the head of the house at the time had some doctrine of Nourish the branches with the blood of the house, which later came back to bite them in the ass a couple of decades ago so in other words shes a branch of a branch the last living in her branch id think”. Carmilla stopped him, “yea that pretty much sums it up. We should probably be getting out of here. Do you have a place to hide those creeps are gonna want to settle the score?” Senarre said to her, “What was that guy?” Carmilla said, “They are as I am.” She paused and said, “Vampyr.”
“We need to get to a defensible position when Grigori and his peons find out that I'm not going back to that hellhole; they'll be out for blood, literally, both mine and yours,” Carmilla said to them while inspecting the receptionist. Senarre said to her, “That's not a problem, but is the desk lady ok?” Carmilla said back to her, “Nothing too major, scratches and bumps, looks like the psychological trauma will be the bigger thing.” Senarre said back to her while reloading her pistol, “Good... or well not good but at least she's alive.” Carmilla turned back to them both, “You are among the gifted, are you not ?” Rosario and Senarre looked at her, confused, “You mean the sound cancellation and black stones ?” Carmilla’s face lit up, “exactly I've searched for one of your ilk for years. I researched them during my time in school and during my first two identities, but I've never been able to study one in person. I was starting to think they didn't exist outside of that man, but tasting the blood of one of you has led me to develop new theories not only about how the gifts work but how I think I can alleviate the nightmares,” Rosario said. “Sounds good, then we give the undead a second death, and then you help me with my problem.”
The three of them ran into the warehouse. Kian was sitting, pouring a fine black powder into small glass vials. He turned to look at them. “What's wrong?” Rosario said, “We're in a bit of a sticky situation. Get your sword and get ready, oh, and get Paulida.”
The six of them sat around a dinner table. Paulida spoke up first, “If they intend to split their forces, which it likely will be, because if we held a choke point, they'd fall right into a killzone and we could take them all at once.” Rosario scratched his chin. “I think Paulida’s right, no way they would force all of their men into an unknown environment, they are gonna try to either divide us or pick us off one by one so we even the playing field. Carmilla, what are their numbers?” She said, “Six Grigori will probably do everything to take me back and put you two in the ground. Vampyr doctrine is usually brutality but Grigori is a crafty little bastard. He knows when to apply force from a different angle to get what he wants. That dirtbag used to like spiking drinks and turning young women who weren't aware what theyd just become just for a fucking kick,theyd scream out in pain fighting the hunger until they went feral. I want him to pay for everything he's done to me and the others over the centuries.” She cleared her throat, “Sorry for the tangent, but there are 6 of them and 5 of us, so if we play the game separately, we can all fight him together. He's got a flair for the dramatic, so I'd imagine he's gonna wanna fight on the roof under the moonlight or something.” Senarre cut in, “I have my guns ill set up in the scrapyard out back. I should be able to cover it by myself, and if I'm forced to get in close, I have a shotgun that would do nicely.” Kian spoke up, “I'll take the east entrance. It's where Kjell keeps all of his spare tools, and I can likely force an encounter there with my Ninjato.” Rosario spoke up next, “I can take the main entrance. I need the space to use my sword and scabbard efficiently.” Carmilla spoke up next, “I can take the 2nd floor scaffold, which should be able to handle that without damaging the ship under the tarp.” Paulida spoke up next, “I'll take the basement, it has a direct connection to the canals that run under the city, and it would be an optimal location to send in another attacker to flank us.” Kjell, the dwarf who was sitting on the floor sipping from a brown glass bottle, spoke up, “I don't care what you do in my damn workshop, just don't damage the equipment or the ship, or I'll charge you double, and remember if you do break anything you'll buy it” Paulida shook his head and said “thank you for letting us use this place old man.” The dwarf looked over to him and said, “Who are you calling old man? old man”