4460/Scent of the Demonic

Scent of the Demonic
Date of Scene:	22 December 2020
Location:	Tribeca
Synopsis:	Lucifer and Amanda end up hunting the same demons.
Cast of Characters:	Lucifer, Amanda Sefton

---

Lucifer has posed:
A black shadow flicks across and under a car, swiftly moving. In the side of an eye, someone might think it was a rat, or perhaps a opossum or feral alleycat. It's none of those; it's far to0 big for any of those, really. It would be one hell of a big cat.

Another shadow moves, parallel to the first, across and beyond some trash cans. The two shadows meet up under a big SUV, as if to compare paths, and then once again flit out into the streets, hunters.

And coming along loosely behind where they were, strolls a man in black, stylish long coat, no gloves or scarf against the cold. He cups a cigarette in one hand, a burst of warmth lighting it as if out of his very palm, and he pauses, with a certain dismayed patience, as smoke curls out of lips and across his nose and cheeks, plumes of swirling heat and burning.

The shadows, and their demonic essence, continue to move and seek, ranging out away from Lucifer himself.

Amanda Sefton has posed:
As Christmas draws ever closer, Amanda has adjusted her schedule to accommodate all of the events her small business been facilitating. Many of them are in the evening. Some in the late afternoon. None, fortunately, have been in the morning, which means she can afford to spend the wee hours out hunting the demonic... *something* that's been plaguing the streets of her city.

In the last month, she's chased down diavlo birds (demonic carrion eaters from a Ravencroft-like hell dimension), a host of shades, several twisted hoards of magic-warped city-dwelling animals, and -- most recently -- a mass of living shadows that tried to turn her and a couple of friends into a late night snack. The problem is, each successive wave of monsters she's fought has been getting stronger.

More than that, the mundanes are starting to notice. There have been disappearances -- pets, vagrants, and now possibly people as well... or so says the news media, at any rate. Police are baffled and, frankly, Amanda hasn't gone anywhere near them to try to clear things up. Because, really? What is she going to tell them?

Thus, she is out on another cold, New York Winter night, hunting more of these monsters, circling ever closer to their origin point. Or, so she hopes.

Garbed in the red and blue, rune-warded leather of Daytripper, she moves silently along the street, following a ghostly looking foxhound. It's not a real ghost, nor even a real hound. It's just a conjured seeking spell, one that even now is picking up on the trail of those shadows that stalk the streets and seek to avoid the Power that could doubtlessly dismiss them with little effort.

The speed of her steps increases as that spectral hunter chases down its prey.

Lucifer has posed:
Lucifer does tend to get avoided by all sorts of things: both 'good' and 'bad'. He's equally shunned, though for extremely different reasons. Which is part of why his demonic hellhounds are ranging well away from him, on the prowl to seek out and find...

But, one of them has gotten a whiff of Daytripper's foxhound, and immediately goes blazing off-target to go after that temptation instead. It lunges out and across from a dumpster, with a chilling, eerie howl. The hellhound is a fairly big creature, the size of a rottweiler, though it's head is a mess of glowing red eyes and layers of shark-like teeth. The foxhound was just too interesting for it to ignore, not at that proximity!

Amanda Sefton has posed:
A hellhound is, in Amanda's estimation, a far more dangerous creature than most anything else she's faced thus far. One is formidable enough. But she knows... where there's one, there's often more.

"*Shiesse,*" she mutters, drawing up short and dispelling the little foxhound with a wave. It fades out with a whine, its tail tucked between its legs. The sorceress draws a shield of eldritch energy around her, reaching out with magical senses to see if the hellhound has any packmates hiding in the shadows -- and where they may be. Because that will greatly determine whether her best course of action now is to attack or portal the hell outta Tribeca until she can come back with help.

Lucifer has posed:
The hellhound circles the area where the foxhound image was, just once, head still low. A few of the red, smouldering eyes fix on Amanda and her shield, but it lowers to sniff around, as if recalling that it was, in fact, doing something else before taking that opportunity to charge what it saw as a fun little treat to menace.

And then from the left, comes the bulk of a second hound. This one, though, stays put, and then orients behind it: clearly waiting for more packmates - such as an alpha of their pack, or a master. There's a lash of a word, a command, in an infernal language, and both hounds eagerly rush backwards, recalled.

"Found anything interesting out here?" floats the curious and friendly tone of Lucifer, on his approach.

Amanda Sefton has posed:
Lucifer's voice draws Amanda's attention away from the hellhounds' unusual behaviour. She lets out a sigh of relief and drops her shield. "You mean aside from your friends?" She gestures to the hounds that even now sit at his feet. She shakes her head.

"I've been out looking for the source of a series of demonic disturbances in this area," she admits. "I haven't actually engaged anything so far tonight. But the night's still young." Her glib words belie the more serious look in her eyes. "What brings you out?"

She has a hunch it may be something similar.

Lucifer has posed:
Lucifer glances at the dogs and laughs, "'Friends' is a strong word. For them." Servants is probably a lot closer. He wanders away from them, closer to Amanda, his smile radiant, with a comfortable ease. Lucifer was getting bored, and Amanda proves to be a lot more interesting overall! The hellhounds don't come along, they move to sit, though, with obvious patience and no irritation about it. Not while Lucifer's present.

"Looks like we share a goal. I'd come through here earlier, but it picks up on me," Lucifer sighs, with a snap of fingers, and then a flutter of hand to demonstrate the thing fluttering off and escaping. "Which means it's aware enough to know it needs to evade me." Lucifer shrugs both shoulders, and nods towards the hellhounds. "Maybe not them." And then his gaze closes more specifically on Amanda. "Or you?"

Amanda Sefton has posed:
Somehow, that doesn't surprise Amanda. "No. Not me," she agrees, grimacing faintly. "I'm pretty sure it sees me as lunch." That also doesn't really surprise her.

"The darkness has been growing steadily in this area since Hallowe'en," she tells him. "I'm not the only one that's felt it. There's another witch I've met -- a fellow Roma. She senses it, too." Only she's a helluva lot less stable than Amanda is. Which is why Amanda is careful about when and how often she relies on her.

She shakes her head lightly. "It started with diavlo in Central Park, but they were from a portal that opened on the Great Hill. I don't know if they're related or not. But I wouldn't be surprised if they were drawn to it, just because of sympatico energies."

Lucifer has posed:
"When something gets strong enough to come onto my radar, there's been some foul business," Lucifer teases, with a quirked smile. He's finished his cigarette, and drops it to the cement, with a lazy and easy exhale of smoke. "But I think to use the hounds... I'll have to make myself scarce," Lucifer says, though he isn't particularly /upset/ about it. It's more the patience of someone that knew he did make a long shot, and isn't surprised it didn't pan out. Lucifer has a lot of patience.

"If you have an area to search, take them over there, if you like," Lucifer suggests, as if lending her his tame pet corgis to frolic with.

Amanda Sefton has posed:
Amanda's brows rise at the offer of the hounds. That... actually is a surprise. She regards the animals for a moment. "They'll listen to me?" Yes, there's a certain skepticism there.

She's not inclined to refuse, however. Hellhounds would certainly make the hunt easier -- on some level, at least. And if they're attacking the things that want to attack her, that may free her to fight more offensively, rather than having to waste more energy than she might otherwise wish to on shielding.

Lucifer has posed:
Lucifer looks at the hellhounds. Listen to her? "Well... no," Lucifer answers, studying them. "But they'll follow the order I've given them, to find that demonic trace." He tilts his head, with a flare of a grin reappearing. "So yes, they'll help, and focus on that. It will require you to not be in their path, though."

So there's a danger level with the hounds, certainly: a cost for their 'help'. Lucifer seems pleased. "It's a relief to just be direct about this. They'll hunt what I want, but they are what they are." Nasty monsters.

Amanda Sefton has posed:
Fair enough, really. Amanda didn't have any thought to get in their way, to begin with. "That makes more sense," she admits. She'll keep a portal spell primed, then. Just in case.

She eyes the pair of them for a moment and then glances back to their master. "Alright, then." She gestures deeper into the neighbourhood, where the sense of the dark grows more oppressive. "That's where I'm going. I'm not sure, now, if my tracking spell was responding to the darkness there or to your hounds. But I'm willing to let them lead the way to find out."

Because that definitely sounds like the safer strategy.

Lucifer has posed:
"I feel like this will be very /interesting/. A shame to sit out," Lucifer laments a little bit. Still, he sends a wink her way. And then turns partially to deal with the dogs. He orders them, quietly, in an undertone, and his presence spreads outwards, as he uses it directly.

It's a sort of unsettling, weird aura that flows out like an extending supernatural shadow. It leaves a subtle ringing in the fibre of the air around them, like a vibration from a very loud sound in an eardrum. An amplified version of what many demons 'feel' when Lucifer's close; just his presence can be felt by them on a core level.

But Lucifer then draws himself back inside himself, closed, though the impact on the immediate area still has that hollow 'sound' to it. The hounds are off like rockets, swift and hunting, their voices muted, but their eagerness and viciousness apparent. Hunt, and punish. And they are eager to do what is in their nature.

"Go ahead, then, with my blessing," Lucifer teases. Or maybe not teasing? Sometimes he's a weird read.