Avenger Assembled

"That sounds like an excellent idea," agreed Jack, who was getting quite a vigorous reaction from the little flier he'd pulled off Stesha. Denied his toy, the little guy had begun to hiss and yelp, pointy teeth making him look like the saddest batboy of all. Shifting around a bit, Jack reluctantly deposited the small creature on his own shoulder. His new buddy immediately clung there like a little gargoyle, clinging almost painfully to Jack's shoulder. "Ow. Yeah, isn't it nicer up there?"

"_I_ like taco pizza," said Jack irritably before editing his order the way Stesha wanted. Secretly, he was glad of it; it meant he'd have an excuse not to eat. When he'd ordered a meat lovers, a veggie lovers, a cheese lovers, and two pepperoni, he hung up and headed for the TV. "No cartoons, but we do have the cartoon network. And Discovery, if they're into that." He wasn't sure why little kids would like science shows, but then Jack hadn't watched that stuff in years. "Uh, they might have a kid's show on Nickelodeon." At the sight of Stesha being mauled by the hair, Jack reached over and scooped up the winged thing by the scruff of the neck. "Hey! You don't want that! She's not pizza!"

"You do know how to handle me," Jack agreed with a wicked smile on his face. The two of them spent a very pleasant evening together after that, one that chased away fears of Claudia and Dracula both for a little while. How could anything that felt so good be a bad idea, anyway? Surely they could handle anything together; even the Prince of Darkness himself.

"Okay, sure," said Jack, trying to stay useful as he headed for the phone. He'd never bothered to take the local Casa del Pizza off the little list of numbers that came with his phone, and used that to call up. "Five Supremes," he guessed over the phone. "With all the taco fixings." Despite his Italian heritage, Jack had never grown up with a particular investment in 'quality' pizza. "And try not to let them eat the place before the guy gets here!" he called.

"I'm sure that would have gone over well," said Jack with a little smile. "Not that she has any grounds for jealousy after the way we parted." He leaned close and kissed her, his hands going on hers. "I'm yours now, not hers. You don't need to have any worries on that score. And as for You-Know-Who...well, we'll deal with that. I doubt even he would come to Freedom City now, not with the League so powerful," he said hopefully.

"Rent, hell," commented Jack, walking over to peer down uncertainly at the little girl-thing in Taylor's grip. At his approach, the girl smiled ingenuously, her eyes turning an odd yellowish-red like a cat's in the light. "I own the place." He smiled at the little girl-thing, reaching down to pet its head. Definitely not human, but it sure did look that way. "Well, this is an interesting way of spending the afternoon. Where do they need to go?"

"Well, yes," said Jack with a little shrug. "That's natural for his..." He caught Taylor's eye and hrmed. "Um, moving on, Claudia certainly has no issues with commingling her blood with human herself, no more so than the, than Dracula does himself. It's because you're a superhero that's the problem. If I'm dominating you, if I'm in the process of converting your soul to darkness, that's one thing. That's what our relations at high levels are supposed to be about. But if it's going the other way, or seen to go the other way...well, that's a sign that I'm corrupting myself by bedding the worst enemies of our people. Or who they think is the worst enemies of our people anyway."

Jack was up and on his feet when he overhead Taylor teleport in, but as he opened the bedroom door he fell dead silent at the sight of the tiny little creatures running around Taylor and Stesha's feet, not to mention the sudden eruption of grapevines all over his expensive coffee table. "Taylor?" he asked, a little uncertainly, "what's going on?" Fresh out of the shower, he was in just his jeans and a T-shirt.

"Oh my God," said Jack, looking appalled as he dropped back onto the couch. Taylor had seen him white-faced before, but this was something else. "Did she say when He was coming?" he asked, still looking faintly stunned. "Is He already on his way?" He ran his hand through his thick black hair. "Maybe it's just an idle threat," he said hopefully. "Claudia always did love playing up our connection to the Dragon. Especially hers. Maybe she's just trying to scare me."

I'm waiting for everyone else's attack as per the coordinated attack rules, I'm just describing it now.

"Blonde vampire?" asked Jack, concern sharp in his voice as he set his cup down hard enough to slosh slightly onto the table. "Short with old-fashioned hair, likes to hiss and use lots of fancy words when she's mad?" He muttered a bad word. "Claudia. I'd heard she'd made it back into the city after her unceremonious departure."

With his girlfriend out of the apartment for school, Jack was doing what most unemployed dropouts did at this time of night: consuming the blood of the living while plotting the overthrow of human civilization. Well, of a small portion of human civilization, anyway. If the Dusk-to-Dawn C's kept operating in the cemeteries of the West Side, eventually they were going to stumble into a nest of angry young turks who would probably object violently to their territory being violated. But if Avenger went in and chased them out, he could take care of everything. Drinking from the open coffee cup he used when Taylor wasn't around, he hmmed as he made a few ticks on his big map of the city spread out on the coffee table, plotting out where he'd be going in a couple of nights.

It does seem like if we're going to allow the one, we should allow the other.

"You think I can control my grandsire's will?" Claudia hissed back. "I was here when he came before, woman. I know the carnage it meant for human and vampire alike. You think that because I lack Jack's scruples I have no feelings? I have no wish to see our children burning in their beds, or yours turned to feedstock. But when the Dragon learns that his blood has taken this city, and that his blood is commingled with the living? With the ridiculous joke that is the superhuman? The holocaust will burn the sky and fill the streets with blood!"

I guess the demon lord doesn't have the soul for dancing!

Mark leaped up from behind the car and yelled weakly "Friends to the end! Friends to the..." He looked around at the holocaust all around him, up at the terrible demon lord before him, and called on his family memories. "You think you can take Freedom City?!" he called up at the huge demon lord. "Buddy, who _are_ you, anyway? You're just some no-account fallen angel who needed his kid to do all the heavy lifting! You're no Hades! You're no Omega! You're just a big bully who likes picking on people smaller than he is, and all you can do is fight teenagers! When this day is over, no one here is even going to remember your NAME!" And with that, Mark leaped up on the car he'd vacated earlier. "And you know what else? LOW BRIDGE!" At his words, a massive flying fortress full of the demonic horde suddenly spun on a wild gyre and went spiraling towards their leader's head!

"Yes yes yes," said Claudia with a waggle of her fingers, for all that her hand had twitched for her collar when Taylor's magic had flared, "you are the guardian of darkness and the light, empowered by arcane magics I could never possibly understand. I've heard that before. From all I've heard, Jack seems to think you're human enough." Once again, the dead eyes were lasers. "You people murder us in our beds and you wonder why your being in Jack's is a problem? Do you have _any_ idea of the holocaust the superheroes of the world have inflicted on us? And you take one of us to bed," she spat. "It's disgusting. And _I_ am the least of your worries, woman. This is no mere usurpation; this is blasphemy that attracts the powerful. For the Dragon has walked the streets of this city before, and you well remember what came afterwards."

"When they come to kill Jack, which they will as soon as they think they can do it without bringing your kind down on our heads, the fight will rip the city's underworld in half." She obviously wasn't talking about organized crime. "Vampires will die. Their families will die. Their allies will die. Innocent bystanders will die, screaming. Kill us all in our beds, as is the style of your kind, and more will simply fill the space. I would think you would know something about the dangers of crossing the line between the human and the inhuman. Guardian of boundaries indeed." She put her hand over her dead heart. "Did he play the troubled boy with you, the damaged young thing who only needed a tender heart? All the dead boys can all do that, Taylor."

"Leave Jack alone," Claudia replied, her voice icy. "He may be powerful, but he's too young and too stupid to realize his relationship with you is going to get a lot of innocent people killed. I don't know what _you_ see in it. You people are supposed to know better than to cross the line. Especially the Chosen of Heshem. Oh yes," she added, "I'm sure that came as a big surprise to Jack. He never had any interest in learning what I had to teach him."

Claudia moved with blinding speed, catching the book inches from her face. It had been close, and Taylor hadn't put her best into the throw, but it wasn't a pretty picture. She eyed the book, eyes moving in a face gone dead and immobile for a moment. "So that's it," she said with a sneer. "We move straight to the violence part of the evening. You people are all alike."

"Chosen of Heshem," Claudia said with a slow, deliberate hiss as her hand landed on Taylor's notebook, "I believe you have something of mine." Her fangs exposed, briefly, like a snake's threat display. "I'll give you this, you know your Greek. Jack always did prefer women smarter than he is."

Jack put his arm around Taylor, even as he beamed at Moira. It was really nice to have his friend back. "Anything you need, Moira, really. We're all just glad to have you back." He sensed that Taylor was a bit uneasy with Moira back, and he was confident enough not to think it was for any unsavory reasons. "Let's see, three months...well, a lot has happened." He shot a glance at Taylor, then at Moira. "We'll talk over lunch."

When Taylor found herself leaving little inky prints on the tabletop, she got up to wash the blue coloring off her hands. When she got back, someone was in her chair. The lady in question was short, no bigger than Taylor herself, with a short pageboy haircut, perfectly-manicured fingers with short nails painted red, dressed in sensible librarian shoes and a sweater and skirt. There was something about her that made even that outfit look sexual, as if she was at the beginning of a sexy librarian skit. She looked up inquiringly at Taylor's approach, but her eyes were absolutely hard. "Yes?"

Claudia and Taylor meet

It was late at night in late November when the thing entered the Freedom College library, a smile on her face as she pushed back her hood. The short haircut she'd died with was in fashion among college students again, letting her blend in and still feel fashionable. Red lips pulling past white teeth, she walked up to the reference librarian by the front gate, among the few people still around at this hour, and smiled sweetly. "Hello," Claudia whispered. Undead ears pricked, finding every human heartbeat in the building. "Could you tell me where I could find Taylor Chun?" She looked him in the eye. In a few moments, the balding old gentleman had happily told her exactly where to find the promising grad student. A few moments more, and she had a perfect description of what she was wearing and what book she'd checked out. Several minutes after that, she left him unconscious amongst the French history volumes, walking away with a swagger in her step and considerably more color in her pale cheeks. She hadn't come for the death of that little man, no indeed. She'd come here with just one person in mind.