1986/Chinatown Girl Power

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Chinatown Girl Power
Date of Scene: 06 June 2020
Location: Chinatown
Synopsis: Vamp meets Firebird. They go for drinks.
Cast of Characters: Rachel Summers, Ella Normandy




Rachel Summers has posed:
    There are times when Rachel feels sorry for herself, and then there are times when she REALLY feels sorry for herself. It's just a matter of degrees these days. Today however, she has her psi-glamor up. Really, all it does is convince people that they're not seeing her scarred up face. She is so ashamed of those markings that she wishes she could be rid of them for good.
    Funny thing. She could, but it just hasn't occurred to her that she could ask the Phoenix to do that. But she sits out front of a local restaurant, enjoying an order of Orange Chicken and Cream Cheese Rangoons as she peoplewatches.... and semi-listens.

Ella Normandy has posed:
    Meanwhile, Vampirella is a few blocks away, in an alley between two brownstones whose curtains are all closed tight despite the noise of battle coming echoing between the concrete facades. Vampirella's opponent is known to her, vaguely, an Unseelie who enjoys slitting human throats to bath his woolen cap in their blood and gain their power thereby: not a proper vampire, but close enough in concept to be her prey. The beast is shorter than she expected, knotted with muscle, dressed in clothes stolen from clotheslines, with a jutting jaw and dark grey skin. It fights her with a wide-bladed ax it uses to decapitate its victims, which even more than privacy is why she chose a tight alley to fight in: it limits his ability to swing the long-hafted weapon.

    Vampirella doesn't pretend she'll be able to permanently kill the thing. She knows the legends too well. Some spark of nightmare will one day reignite its soul and reconstitute its body. She doesn't care. Right now, there is only cold, reptilian fury at this beast which would dare to hunt in her presence, dare to intrude on her territory; offenses it will die for. She hurls herself at Redcap one last time, her body tall and strong with the transformation to her warform. She clamps her fingers onto its ax mid-swing and slams it into his chest, pinning him against a wall. She does not waste a moment's time threatening or gloating: she simply bites and drinks, and soon Redcap is still while its life's experiences gush into Vampirella's eternally ravenous belly, filling her with fresh life.

Rachel Summers has posed:
    The violence, hunger and all of those base emotions roiling in the area catch Rachel's attention. You see, she was semi-surfing on the surface emotions of those around her, and much like a bloodhound that caught a scene it recognized, but didn't know it recognized, she feels the flicker of emotion down the way.
    Following that trickle, she sensed a stronger pulse. But before she knows why she is doing it, she's up on her feet and walking... power-walking in that direction.
    Only when she reaches the mouth of the alley does it occur to her that what she is feeling is similar to the hatred she feels coming from the anti-mutant activists that have attacked her and her people so often of late.
    SO, it is with flickers of flame licking along her shoulders, and from her hair and eyes that she turns the corner. She is ready to show these people that they messed with the wrong girl.
    Gone is her glamor. Gone is any pretext of being a normal human. Her scarred face is drawn in determination and frustration... before all of that fades away at the sight of the ... horror before her.
    And, eloquent as she is... one word sums it all up, "Huh?" she asks.

Ella Normandy has posed:
    Vampirella's head whips around to face you as she drops her prey, whose body isn't just exsanguinated but is dessicating before Rachel's eyes. The near-naked woman's mouth and chin are smeared with blood, but somehow the rest of her is pristine; even after the obviously violent fight, her long, black hair isn't so much as mussed. Those blood-red orbs evaluate Rachel closely, and her bestial nose flares as she sniffs the air.

    "Human," she pronounces in her movie-thick accent. "Were you this thing's ally? If so, come and try to take your revenge."

Rachel Summers has posed:
    Repeating herself a little bit, Rachel remarks, "Huh?" But then something occurs to her. "Human? That's not the sort of thing I hear a lot."
    She doesn't seem... afraid. Which is weird for a human, for a mortal. But she looks to the desiccated body and grimaces while wrinkling up her nose, "What in the hell -was- that? I mean aside from ugly as fuck."
    And then she look up to you, "Okay, so... are you actually a vampire? Or just some mutant who has powers similar to those sorts of things? I thought they were just a myth."

Ella Normandy has posed:
    Vampirella eyes Rachel warily. The flames around the human (who objects to being called him; probably a mutant, then) are subsiding, which suggests the threat is as well. She straightens up from the low, guarded stance she'd been in, and at the same time begins shrinking. Her bones and flesh audibly pop and crackle as muscles lose their iron hardness, her fingers shrink back into properly three-jointed human digits, her claws retract into suggestively short fingernails, her eyes lighten to human colors (green irises, if you can see that well in the dark). She raises a thumb to her mouth and starts wiping away the blood, feeding it between her lips. It shouldn't be so easy or stain-free to get the blood off her skin without water, but she's doing it all the same.

    "That was Redcap, an Irish monster that feeds on human blood. It will be again one day, I'm sure," she says with a shrug. "If it learned its lesson, it will stay far away from me." She crosses her arms somewhat haughtily, somewhat offended. "And what are you?" she asks pointedly. Not who; what.

Rachel Summers has posed:
    "It will stay far away.... I don't thnk self preservation is that thing's strong suit." offers Rachel as she fearlessly struts forward. Her hands go into her jeans pockets and the overhead alley street light flares on her face as she walks into said light.
    Those markings going from her cheeks, forehead, and chin, out to the edge of her head into the hairline and neckline. Scars for sure.. and they look ritual.
    "So... you didn't answer my question. But I will say this.. that creature, even as it died, was not thinking about regrets or what it might have failed at... it was thinking about what it would do when it got back to this world... how it might try to hurt you more. That is not the thought of a creature who is learning from its mistakes."

Ella Normandy has posed:
    Vampirella narrows her eyes in annoyance. There's joy and passion in her right now, nearly overwhelming intensity of it--there always is, after she feeds--but the borrowed emotions lend themselves just as easily to hurt feelings as to supportive ones. "No, I didn't answer your question. I threw it back at you to see how like someone asking what you are before they ask who you are."

    A sensitive vampire?

    "And no, I don't expect it to learn," she says picking up the ax off the ground and swinging it hard enough into the pavement to break the head off the haft and blunt the blade pretty severely. The handle clatters hollowly as she drops it again, then bends over to pick up the bloody woolen cap. "But it will have a hard time after I've bleached this properly."

Rachel Summers has posed:
    Feeling that passion flowing off of you, Rachel lets her own green eyes widen for just a moment. But then she narrows them and nods her head, "Point taken."
    She steps over to look down to the body once more, and then looks to the hat and the weapon. "So. Creatures of folklore. Redcaps are of the fae stories, right? That's all real?" she asks as she steps back a half pace. "So, why are you killing these things?"

Ella Normandy has posed:
    Vampirella shrugs as she wrings out the cap, not into her mouth as you might expect but onto the ground. A surprising trickle of blood flows out of it, which isn't how blood works in most cases. "Dunno if they're all true. I haven't checked all the folklore yet." Her word choice is extremely American, and sounds somehow at odds with the accent. "And I killed it because it kills people. Now it can't, for a little while." She gives Rachel the eye, as if wondering if the question is a trick.

Rachel Summers has posed:
    "You kill them because they kill. That seems a circular logic. Doesn't that make you just as bad as they are?" asks Rachel. But she shakes her head and shrugs. "But .. that thing is going to be back? So killing it isn't -killing- it." It is like she's working through the logic out loud, brainstorming in the open.
    She takes a long breath and then asks, "Do you want me to destroy that for you? I could do so with a thought." she says, gesturing to the cap.

Ella Normandy has posed:
    Vampirella sighs, feeling suddenly very tired. "I kill them because they kill PEOPLE," she repeats, with heavy emphasis. "And destroying the cap is useless. It's not really a cap, it's a symbol. Any cap could replace it. The importance of the act is to destroy the blood. That is where the power lies. Where it always lies."

Rachel Summers has posed:
    Lifting brows, Rachel doesn't understand the supernatural at all. "Huh." she states. "I would think the power of such a being would lie in the belief in it. But if the power -is- in the blood, why can't you just take -all- of the blood and be rid of it?"
    That asked, she pauses and then shakes her head, "Hey, I'm sorry. You caught me off guard. I'm Rachel." she says, offering a hand in greeting.

Ella Normandy has posed:
    Vampirella looks at the cap with obvious disdain. "Because live blood is one thing. Dead blood is another. Never consume death." She doesn't shake Rachel's hand, instead lifting her palm to show the bloodstains the wet cap left on it. "But thank you," she grudgingly offers, thawing some despite herself. "My name is Vampirella. Why did you come here, Rachel?"

Rachel Summers has posed:
    "Really? Your name is Vampirella? Wow." says Rachel. "I mean if we're using those names..." She smirks and looks down at the offered hand. She lifts her hand up from where she offered it, and the blood itself sizzles a bit before it floats off of the hand and into the air. There, it coalesces and condenses before Rachel closes her hand into a fist... the blood basically disintegrated.
    "I also go by Phoenix." she says as the flames lick over her arms, shoulders, head and hair.

Ella Normandy has posed:
    Vampirella raises an eyebrow at the bit of flash. "You burn but don't consume? Maybe your name should be I Am That I Am," she suggests drily.

Rachel Summers has posed:
    "The Phoenix is not -flame-. It is psionic power that manifests in a way that visually -appears- to be flames. So.. this does not burn, it merely... shows when the power level rises far enough." That said, she closes her eyes and dampens the power, letting the flames fade away. "But, if you want, I can show you why it is called the Phoenix... not merely something else flame based."

Ella Normandy has posed:
    Vampirella normally wouldn't care, but with a full belly, she always feels a little more indulgent of others. "Go ahead," she invites, without moving any closer to this strange witchwoman so eager to show off her powers to a stranger. Why is she like that? She must be terribly lonely. Vampirella can sympathize.

Rachel Summers has posed:
    It's safer to show off to someone like a vampire who kills the killers. But yes, also lonely as hell. "It can be dramatic. I don't mean it to be but it is what it is." she states as she steps back one, two, and then three paces. She spreads her arms out to her sides.
    And that is when the energy explodes outward from her. Flames licking outward in a winged shape and a bird's beak seeming to grow up over her head. The aura fits her like a glove... "Witness... the Phoenix." she remarks as she closes her eyes and turns her head skyward.

Ella Normandy has posed:
    Not fire, just psionic energy that looks like fire? Vampirella eyes it warily all the same. She's never liked people who wield fire as a weapon. Too often, their prefered targets are tied to stakes. But this kind of display, this summoning of fire in a dark alley like Rachel WANTS everyone on the block to see what she's doing... there's something going on there. A woman tired of wearing her mask, maybe. Does that mean she's reaching out to Vampirella? To Vampirella specifically?

    No. If Rachel would do this kind of display in this environment, then she'd do it for anyone, not just for Vampirella. The thought disgruntles Vampirella, so she sits on it until it stops squirming. And it's possible there's something to it Vampirella is missing; she can't help suspecting the show is some kind of dominance identifier, a display of power to prove where in a hierarchy Rachel stands.

    In the meantime, Rachel probably wants some kind of response. "Very pretty," Vampirella observes politely but noncommitally.

Rachel Summers has posed:
    Okay, let's be honest. It's less about showing off for you. Or for showing off to anyone. IT's more a display of.... THIS IS ME WORLD! SUCK IT! She is tired of hiding who and what she is from everyone for fear of how they will react and how they might blame her. This is less a showy showoff as it is just letting off all of the frustration and pain.
    She lowers her arms, and dismisses the aura as she lowers her chin. Her eyes open and a trail shows on one cheek made by a tear. "That is the Phoenix." she says.

Ella Normandy has posed:
    It would be the simplest thing in the world to comfort Rachel, to be open and vulnerable, to share the moment and lessen its burden. But Vampirella can't let go of the wary distrust that's kept her alive for so long. The best she can do is gesture toward Rachel's tear with her chin and offer with guarded sympathy, "It doesn't look like you like the Phoenix much."

Rachel Summers has posed:
    She smiles sadly and shakes her head, "Oh, don't get me wrong. I love it. It's just..." Rachel shakes her head, "I usually get a different reaction. Usually it's humans blaming mutants for being mutants. I am just happy to meet someone whose first question after seeing it is whether I -enjoy- it. Believe me, it's a huge burden. Being the host for a cosmic being that boosts my own power."

Ella Normandy has posed:
    A short but unforced and slightly bitter laugh escapes Vampirella's throat; a laugh of commiseration. "Sounds like a mother," she says, in the tone of someone agreeing with you. Though she's still standing back at what she thinks of as 'pouncing distance', she's at least not folding her arms defensively in front of her any more.

Rachel Summers has posed:
    "Which part? The judgement from normal folks? Or the cosmic entity bonded to my soul?" asks Rachel, her own voice a bit bitter. She shakes her head and shrugs. "So, I'm a burning bird of doom, and you're a vamp that hunts monsters. It sounds like if we walked into a bar, it'd be the start of one of the worst jokes in history."

Ella Normandy has posed:
    Rachel is trying. Vampirella is cold and hard, but not heartless. She relents, taking a step closer; silently, despite the boots she's wearing, which must be a hell of a trick. "That your way of asking me out for a drink?" she asks with a little smile, one eyebrow arched.

Rachel Summers has posed:
    Inclining her head, Rachel thinks that through. "You know. I think I could -use- a good stiff drink." She pauses and side-eyes you, "You do drink things that aren't blood, right?" she asks.

Ella Normandy has posed:
    Vampirella shakes her head. "No. But I am curious to see where you'd take me for a drink." There's a slight emphasis on the word 'me' that is pointedly not accompanied by a glance downward at her outfit.

Rachel Summers has posed:
    Snorting, Rachel shakes her head, "Well, now... you've got me curious. Let's go to the nearest bar. I couldn't care less which one. Whatever is closest." She smirks, "My treat."