#bookedrevenge

[devilsvenom]

@bookedrevenge

"Just when you think you have it figured out, something new begins to take." Lis spoke, almost panting after finishing up a training set with Book. She'd gone hard, perhaps harder than she had before in these and actually managed to land a good few hits on the well-trained hunter much to her surprise. Normally she was lucky if she got one against someone so experienced. "You ever feel like these fuckers aren't going to be the death of us? It feels like my death is going to come from within most days." With all that rage bubbling, it wouldn't be the enemies skill that would cause her death, it would be mistimed rage leading to a simple, stupid mistake. That she was almost sure of. "I was never as good as I thought I was, just knew how to dress it up." Annalise unwrapped her hands, discarding the material to the side. If I was good enough, a fucking human never would've gotten the upper hand. Then her thoughts completely u-turned, as she looked to Book and narrowed her eyes, "Did you know?" About my brother, Booker, did you know he was out there whilst I was grieving and losing myself to the rage?

[kannivalistic]

closed starter for @bookedrevenge where/when: sweetwater, drinking time

There was something about bad beer that just felt comfortable. Maybe it was the fact that even a bad beer was better than some halfway-decent wines, or it was the fact that it still did the job in taking the edge off. Or maybe, not everything had to have a silver lining. Sweetwater's watered-down piss of a tap beer was just a reminder that not everything in life was chocolates and roses. And she'd still take the beer over the roses any afternoon.

Valka liked Book, if for one reason more selfish than the others -- dude was from Boston. Southie, honest sort, salt of the earth, salt on the rim of her beer. Over the years, the blood ties of family meant less and less to her as she lost loved ones, butted heads with the rest, and tried to make a little something more than herself with the Fellowship. But roots in the earth, in a place? Those ran pretty damn deep. And it was like taking a little piece of home to Port Leiry, terra firma.

"Yo, Book," she waved as she saw the other hunter from across the musty taproom. "You should stop by Two Sundays tomorrow, got some beautiful tomahawks in. I'll sell you a couple at wholesale."

[anikabooker]

ANIKA BOOKER ⸻ A COLLECTION OF ART

I. SOFT MELANCHOLY

Three paintings describing her nightmares. The loss of people and the loss of herself. The past — a fundamentally hostile place. The present — a constant longing for a way out.

An army of ghosts — acrylics/ framed canvas 32 x 24 Ophelia — acrylics/ framed canvas 24 x 18 Escape — acrylics/ framed canvas 40 x 30

II. METAMORPHOSIS The slow transition from woman to monster. The past versions of herself sloughing off like dead skin.

Medusa — watercolor/ framed canvas 24 x 30 Moss — watercolor/ framed canvas 24 x 30

III. EVAPORATE

Two people that have wordlessly dispersed into the air. She’d argue they were ever there in the first place. All real people on that canvas are fictional, only the fictional are real. Sometimes she wants to wordlessly disperse into the air too. (@reidhalstead)

01. — acrylics/ framed canvas 24 x 30 02. — acrylics/ framed canvas 24 x 30

IV.

I am you. You are me. (@bookedrevenge)

Found. — acrylics/ framed canvas 24 x 30 Lost. — acrylics/ framed canvas 24 x 30

[reidhalstead]

For: @bookedrevenge

A routine that's been almost four years long begins to finally feel a degree closer to contempt. Do something like clockwork for long enough and it's simply part of life — in this case, death. Reid helps the occasional campus rogue back to their dorms, whilst eradicating the rodent infestation that started beneath the humanities building. He doesn't like to talk about how. But it's routine. And sometimes, he gets a glimmer of forgetfulness; for a few moments, to know that he's living in a place where only his worst nightmares could manifest.

It's four am and dawn plans to visit again in the coming hours. He's finished his late shift on the campus, and he's walking home. Jacket zipped tight, black cargos specked with mud, and boots glazed with the same.

He's no closer to where he wants to be, he's got no more answers, or reasons to make this life something worth it. But, it's always around the time his body craves rest, and to satiate a thirst that he begins to fall into the trap of his self-loathing. The doubts he's had placed there for years, festering like a parasite.

He slips into a lane, dodging around an industrial wastebin wedged between bricked buildings; it's a shortcut — his knees bend, and he jumps up the wall, hand gripping the top as he hoists himself up — it's just as he can swear he hears his name being called.

Halstead. It's almost urgent.

It's unlike him to miss the sounds these days; impossible, on others where he cannot turn it down. His head twitches as he holds himself up on the wall, his right ear pointed in the direction of the noise. Even when it's so piercing, it's deafening. Reid's even more sure he's heard that voice; he knows that voice. It's buried in a memory he longs to forget:

Where a soldier's rough pats him on the shoulder and smiles — it's a little bit of pride, and a lot more teeth. Reid's hand is splayed out eagerly. There's a needle vibrating against his hand. His parents are there, his sisters are envious. It's a good day. Book's near him and they're uttering inaudible words. But it's him. Halstead's talking with vigour. Seething about how he's going to find all the creatures, continue his family's legacy —

He's making promises that he swears he'll keep; til his dying breath. Oaths to the brotherhood that he will be the sword and the saviour —

It's not his voice. It simply can't be.

Halstead.

Reid—!

He's still halfway over the wall when he freezes, darkening eyes fly to the end of the alleyway; a mass of muscle stands there, staring him right in the eye. Shadows could hide Reid all they liked; there's a glow down the lane, and the streetlamps are positioned in the others' favour.

Reid could run. He could do better, even. He could do a world of things; he's been on the other side of this scenario. A hunter staring down the prey of a creature. But now, Reid knows what it's like to be on the other side of it. That gnawing where instinct tells him to attack; to pursue and hunt instead like a primal predator. He tightens his grip on the wall, even as Book's steps enter the alley. One of Reid's legs swings the wall, and he sits, almost lifting himself slowly upwards as if he might be ready to pounce.

Book, you cannot be here.

Of all the people to see Reid like this —

But Halstead can hardly run from the hunter he'd looked up to, once. Still did, even. Despite everything surging in the storm of his chest; heat pools at Reid's eyes. Rage is one thing, guilt another — eternal damnation in all its glory, is another entity entirely. What can Reid possibly say here, to an approaching hunter? What's the hundreds of things monsters have begged, or pleaded with him right before he's struck the final blow? Reid never listened; never showed mercy. Book's everything he was, but twice the experienced; twice the hardened soldier. Reid doesn't even move from the wall, even when he turns his head away slightly, it's not enough; it's too late.

He's been clocked. He tries anyway: "Get out of here, Book."

[lcblanc]

For: @bookedrevenge

[ Text : Booker ] I hope you liked my final piece [ Text : Booker ] I didn't sign it, of course, but I'd imagine a man of your... intellect wouldn't need a signature. [ Text : Booker ] And all I needed was a helping hand to put it all together.

[wretchedsums]

who: @bookedrevenge when: the masquerade [pt II]

He sees him running straight for the madding crowd after a moment's delightful conversation and, excusing himself, shoves his hands into his pockets and hustles, with a blur of motion, directly into his path, shoulder checking him and planting a well-inked palm directly into book's sternum, pushing him back. "There's hotlines for it, if you're ideating, Booker - you sure you don't wanna give one of those a call?"

[rimedancer]

who: @bookedrevenge where: somewhere dank when: sometime after #cor.summerfest

When her eyes open she's not at the stupid festival anymore, and the corner of her face is sore, and she can feel the heat where her head's cut open, blood dried in a freezeframe where it crept down the side of her head. Something is binding her hands, and she immediately starts worrying at it, trying to figure out what it is and how she can get it off. The room she's in isn't bereft of other people or other details either, sigils make her feel like the tethers she usually holds over the natural forces around her are unnaturally slack, loose, week as overstretched taffy, like pulling on them might stretch them interminably. Jennifer grits her teeth, and realizes one of them is broken, which is when she remembers Cazdor's kick to her face that had sent her into the deep dark. The moments are uncountable, stretched and condensed all at once while she tries to get a sense of the dim room that smells like iron and filth and then she hears the door creak as a sliver of light grows into something blinding, the only relief the silhouette that steps in front of it, which she hardly thinks could be any sort of salvation.

[heronyearwood]

for: @bookedrevenge where: some hold house inland when: daytime

While Port Leiry's riverfront is pleasant; the ambience is clean and tidy, clearly well tended, its the quiter end of it that she favors from this old house they've commandeered. The balcony from which she catches a breath of frush, iron-free air is well situated to give Heron a nice vista downriver, towards the upbuilt parts of town and the sea beyond it. She appreciates its order and organization, and while the city sports it on the surface, she knows that under that veneer lurks tangled webs all dripping with filth that she cannot wait to burn away. She takes a spoon of fruit and cream and indulges in a sensible lunch as she takes in the view, but then she decides to check the time, and realizes that she has lingered entirely too long. She takes her bowl and moves back inside, first to the kitchen, where she puts the half-finished parfait into a refrigerator and, stepping around the counter, removes a set of pliers from where she left them, and then moves across the parquet and towards a heavy oak door before stopping to replace a messy apron, idly tying it around her waist. She hears the click of old brass and looks to the door as it opens, her compatriot appearing from within the next room. "Did it say anything yet?" She asks, musically, as she pulls gloves on, the snap of them a clap in the otherwise quiet room. "Or do we need to move on to more convincing methods of conversation?"

She winces, the protest from her dead Brotherhood mark endlessly reminding her of its presence. "Damn old thing," hisses heron under her breath.

[kingofthehunt]

( @bookedrevenge -- a bar late, at night )

It's been a while. A good while. Elias is not one for friendship meetings, or so called hangouts. He's more down for any kind of business talk -- no matter if with a fellow hunter, or a supernatural creature. Book falls in between somewhere -- not Brotherhood, but at least not a biter. At least not in that sense.

"To health.", the hunter toasts before pouring down the shot he's ordered, vodka burning down his throat in a trail. He pulls a face -- he's more for sweet and sour than bitter -- and slams the small glass back onto the table. "What have you been up to?", he asks in curiosity, then. "I haven't heard a lot from you recently. I almost thought you were looking into retirement." He himself has thought about it, and simply discarded the thought.

Why would he. There's still enough witches left.

[anikabooker]

@bookedrevenge

[devilsvenom]

closed. / @bookedrevenge

Defected or not, Book was one of the few people left in her life that she could actually put an ounce of trust in. Switching to The Fellowship wasn't going to put a dent in that. Annalise couldn't afford it to. He knows her well, sometimes well enough to make her uncomfortable; she likes to be a mystery but he's been in her life long enough to know what she was like before Reid died, and the completely different person she is now. That was the day any inner child in her died, the day her parents came home to tell her that her brother was dead. They hadn't protected him, and he hadn't been golden enough to protect himself. She blamed them, if she were honest. Her father more than her mother, which was easily done with his complete lack of empathy. Sometimes, Annalise thought he had no emotions at all. Book was the father figure she had never asked for, but was more than happy to receive.

"You still got time for me in your busy Fellowship schedule, old man?" She chided, leaning against the door frame as she looked towards the other. Lis tried to ignore the gnawing feeling, the voices in her head telling her that Book moving to the Fellowship equaled him leaving her. It was hard to fight against a voice that was so often right. "I still want my weekly training session, followed by whatever food and activity we decide on that night. Can they possibly spare you, or are they so much better than us that you're working every minute of the day?" Okay, so she was a little salty about it...

[kannivalistic]

VALKA HADLEY; masquerade. august 2024.

No thanks, she just ate. Valka Hadley, the "Butcher Bird", doesn't even want to be here. The entire affair reeks of excess and idiocy, and the Fellowship hunter would rather use her evening to plan her next strike. But the event came up too quickly for her to truly maximize the impact of her machinations. So she's here, she's hungry for revenge, and yeah, she saw @bookedrevenge's mask. Real cute.

[cityofruinrp]

@one-eyed-arther

@heronyearwood

@bookedrevenge

[anikabooker]

where,  — masquerade ball / part II closed  — @lcblanc @bookedrevenge

She did the only thing she knew how to do, despite this situation being far from her calculations: she looked for exit signs and escape routes. Scanned her brain for all the possible paths she could take to flee, because what Markus pulled out his sleeve was unfamiliar but the ache in her chest was not.

Good that she was tracking the fucker — follow his every move, for as long as the spell was active.

Chaos errupted around her — bodies slamming into one another, blood splashing on the marble floor, masks now off, weapons drawn. Eyes big, and on fire burned through every man — in hope, of finding her father. Alas, he was nowhere in sight, and she cursed having him in this town, in the first place. With him gone — fleeing would be easy, killing would be even easier and her concious would not be clouded by worry.

Anika couldn't leave — not without him.

Dagger out, swiftly held by her side; the tip of the blade hidden beneath the ends of her dress, she pushed past a figure, "Move." she mouthed, dazed. There was smoke in her lungs, and it was drying her insides causing for her voice to become less hunter, and more mortal.

[anikabooker]

The realization that her father had decided to ignore a chunk of her words, downed on her, like a bucket of cold water. "Did you hear what I said?" her jaw was tight, and those words barely made it through her gritted teeth in a way that wasn't hostile, but rather calm. The kind of calm, before a storm hit. She repeated, slower this time. "Did you hear what I said?" No, he wasn't listening. He was biting at her. Snarky, little comments more suitable for a child, than a grown man. A father. The look in her eyes darkened, pinning her father in place. "You're ridiculous, you know that, right?" There was a slight shake to her voice, for the briefest moment, before Anika erased any trace of it. The last he's behaved like that, she was a teenager. Memories from that time scattered like frightened pigeons. She couldn't remember if it was a party he caught her coming back from, when he'd already told her not to go in the first place, or that time he caught her stealing. It didn't matter. Those memories were insignificant. Silly, little dents in her past. What mattered, what she could remember, very vividly, was having no where to go. What she could remember was various hands she didn't want to feel on her. The first time she shot a man dead. Not out of desperation, not out of anger, but because she was forced to. He didn't ask her, and she never told him.

Reid's voice, on the other hand, was like a blasting alarm too early in the morning. No snooze button, just the itching of a balled hand ready to smash it into pieces. Just so it would shut the fuck up.

She didn't scratch the itch this time. Let the noise be just that — noise. Empty of any meaning. Eyes, cold and his, remained on her target. “Did you fucking stop to think how I got here? How I found you?” Her back no longer ghosted Reid’s bare chest, but moved closer to Book. “I’m in a lot of fucking dept, with beasts far worse than this guy.” A hand flew out in her roommates direction, index finger pointing at him like a sword. She’d almost laughed — a hollow, bitter huff of air released from her nostrils. This was bullshit. All of this was bullshit.

A Booker. What the fuck did that even mean? That godforsaken name had lost all meaning when their family had shattered like glass on the ground. A fragile, beautiful vase now in pieces. Anika finally adressed the static noise over her shoulder, “Why do you keep saying that?” she asked, without as much as a look in his direction. “That name means nothing. My family is dead." A pause.

Her attention snapped back to her father. " — or have you forgotten that? News flash, your family is dead. And you went and what? Proclaimed yourself king of the fucking jungle?”

Anika couldn't stay. She couldn't listen to another word. Her father's foolish remarks, and Reid's promises made, like a child scolded by their teacher. Arms raised, facing the wall, chanting: this would never happen again, this would never happen again —

If he only knew last night, would he have looked at her the same way? In the dark of the room, would he have reached for her, if he knew? She didn’t want an answer. So, she spared the two men her fury, and reached for her jacket, spread out on the couch. Leaving, but not without meeting Reid's eyes first. “Well, fuck you.”

Then, a last glance at the man who had as much of himself in her, as she had of herself in him. "I've spent twelve years on my own, I can do twelve more." a beat. "Don't push it."

@bookedrevenge / @reidhalstead

Every muscle is spring-loaded, ready to launch at Reid with a father's fury. It doesn't matter that he once considered this man a son, or that he knows that he's now a vampire with enhanced speed and strength. All he can think about is how he had just gotten Anika back into his life, and there was already someone else occupying a spot in it. It's irrational and illogical, but the events of the night are catching up to him as he tries to parse through rapidfire thoughts.

Reid's surprise isn't lost on him, and it's the only thing that keeps him from reaching out to throttle him. The blond throws out a hand between them, as thought it might protect him, and Book envisions snapping his wrist without batting an eye. But before he can make that into a reality, Anika steps between them and his eyes immediately shift downward to meet hers.

There is no accusation in them, only confusion and a sliver of hurt. Why all these lies and obfuscations? Why keep him at such a distance when she clearly has no problem confiding in strangers? Her explanation is lacking, and he wants to know more, all the details of how they'd even met in this godforsaken city. Of all people, how it was Reid that stumbled upon her.

"Spare room also involve his closet?" he asks finally with a less than impressed look. But Book is also struck with a sense of déjà vu, remembering a moment decades ago, when his possessiveness and jealousy had nearly cost him everything. He works his jaw for a long moment, eyes sliding from Anika to Reid and feeling oddly out of place.

There are a million and one things he wants to say. To repeat his offer for her to live with him. To apologize for losing his temper. To ask her if she knows what Reid is. There are no bite marks on her skin, but that doesn't mean that he isn't healing her, and immediately the protective flare roars again. "If you touch her," he growls over her head at Reid, making it obvious what he means. "You won't come back this time."

@reidhalstead @anikabooker

[anikabooker]

closed  — @bookedrevenge

She knew her father wasn't gallery exhebitions and pats on the back, excessive tenderness and champagne glasses. She wasn't, either. Hence the flask, and that look on her face that kept most people away. Anika was okay with that — the way they were, the way he was — not the way he could be if she twisted the pieces, or painted him in different shades of monochrome. Not the green monster he was, a couple of nights ago either. Because that too, was someone else entirely. But in his defense — in her defense, they were both still trying to figure this out; how to talk to each other, how not to talk to each other, how much to show, how much to hide.

"I painted that for you — " they stood before the most morbid painting of them all, but she was looking at him. "— It was some time ago and I wasn't sure you'll ever see it." Anika paused, if only to blink herself sober, but there was no getting rid of that thick fog her vision drowned in.

There was no point of trying to hold in the laughter that followed. "Wasn't sure we'd be alive to talk about it."

Not ha-ha funny, sure. But still hilarious in a twisted kind of way — because they were supposed to consider themselves lucky. Because many would call that luck — you're lucky to be alive. And they both knew, luck had nothing to do with it. They both knew, there were no gods to thank.