[Shaman_Yuri]

Firefly blinks as she comes to focus on the elf before her.  "This Anders person seems to have come out of nowhere.  You understand what he's saying; I'm just following his meaning with a translation app.  What do you think of him?  Arc seems to like him but he's new to her too, right?"

[Mercy Merchant]

Yelena tilts her head a bit and looks quizzically at Firefly.  "Yes.  Yelena speak Norwegian with him.  From time in Oslo.  He wants come Poland.  Is mage with spirits.  Decker mage handle that?  And why change subject?"

[Shaman_Yuri]

The girl's brow furrows in a worried expression.  "You trust him so quickly?  After what just happened...to you I mean?"

[Mercy Merchant]

Yelena shrugs her shoulders.  "Is good question.  Man helped Feathers.  Makes good for Yelena until prove otherwise.  And Yelena try hard stay off drugs so not happen again.  And still change subject.  Want come ink place to watch tattoos then talk?  Decker mage need talk somebody or soon explode from too much inside.  Yelena can listen."

[Shaman_Yuri]

Firefly is quiet for several moments. Her eyes seem distant, and not like they are when she's focused on the matrix or astral.  "You may not like what you hear, Yelena-sensei," she finally says with a frown.  "Any more than I will like saying it."

[Mercy Merchant]

Yelena looks at the young woman.  "Yelena is sixty-five years old.  Yelena hear many things not like.  Yelena know that bad things not get better by not hearing.  Yelena want hear what trouble decker mage.  Is important.  Pick up at 0800 tomorrow.  Go Ink Palace.  Get ink then talk.  Woman to woman.  Maybe decker mage sleep here tonight?  Yelena get bike back and take Marco home.  Stay there.  Come get Firefly in morning.  Good, yes?""

[Shaman_Yuri]

Firefly nods.  "I may have more information about this Anders fellow by then as well."

[Mercy Merchant]

Yelena nods.  "Yes.  Decker mage keep looking.  Tell Yelena if find anything.  He say from Oslo.  Maybe check records there.  Yelena pick you up here 0800.  And must stop changing subject.  Yelena not go school but not stupid.  Firefly need talk someone if not Yelena."

After getting a nod from the girl, Yelena goes to round up Marco.  "Time Yelena go home.  Marco come Yelena?"  She makes one last stop with Feathers, telling him she hopes he recovers well and fast.  Then turning to Merlin and the Howlers, she spends a few minutes talking to them in Or'Zet.  Finally done, she rolls the bike to the door, pushing it through when Arc opens it.  She climbs on the large bike and turns it on, feeling the rumble of the powerful engine between her legs.  After Marco climbs on and puts his arms around her she kicks the machine into gear and roars off down the street.

Once at the apartment building, she parks in Marco's assigned spot in the garage.  Taking his hand in hers she walks with him to the elevator and up to his (maybe theirs) apartment.  She follows him through the door, leaning against it as she shuts it.  She stays at the door, looking at him until he realizes that she is not with him and turns to her.  "Marco.  Is Yelena.  Is real Yelena.  Yelena ready to say in love.  Ready to give chance.  Is Marco?  Yelena can be tiger in bed, can roll over all furniture.  Be wild.  Be sexy.  But tonight Yelena want be Yelena.  Yelena want Marco talk love.  Want Marco make love Yelena.  Not just sex.  Frantic later.  Love now.  Yelena make sense?"

Marco is not too sure what makes sense when it comes to Yelena, but he comes back and takes her hand to lead her to the bedroom.  She has him stand still and watch her undress then undresses him slowly, allowing her fingers and lips to caress every part of his body.  Slowly and seductively.  When done, she stands and looks into his eyes with her violet ones and whispers.  "I love you, Marco."

With that, she takes him to bed and makes love to him.  Not frenetic, as it has been in the past.  Not with wild abandon as it has been in the past.  But strong and passionate.  She takes her time to taste him and feel him and let him do the same.  She allows him to fully explore her, using everything he has learned about sex in his time as a professional lover.  All she has is what she has learned, but it is decades of lovemaking.  The first explosion is over an hour into the experience, but neither were counting the minutes or even cared.  He took her to heights of pleasure she did not know she could reach and then he exploded inside her again.  She had been on top and now collapses on his chest, exhausted and emotionally drained.  She rolls off him and lies next to him, panting.  Turning her head, she looks into his eyes and says, "I love you, Marco."  With that, she begins to cry.  Huge tears with no sound roll down her cheeks to the bed.  She puts her face into his chest and cries for minutes, releasing years of emotions for a life derailed by betrayal and a fear of being alone that she had not known she had.  He silently comforts her, somehow knowing that no words needed to be said.  He strokes her snowy tresses until she falls asleep with her face still against his chest.

[Mulcarn]

Anders finishes up his talk with Yelena and agrees to meet her on Tuesday.  They arrange a meeting point in Touristville at one of the bars.  He waves the she-elf goodbye as she leaves with another elf, probably her boyfriend he thinks to himself.  Anders spends a few moments in reflection.  "Well this was unintended.  I just wanted to try out that new mystery drug.  Everything went to hell and now i'm paling around with these guys.  They seem like a cool bunch.  Arc looks pretty and has been nice so far.  Yelena however... i'm not sure.  I should keep my guard up around her.  Her accent sounded russian if I had to guess.  Yet she speaks norweigian.  She did say she lived in Oslo for 5 years.  I wonder how recently though.  I'm probably worrying about nothing.  I doubt anyone here knows anything."

He rests his head against a knuckled fist propped up on the counter as he thinks about Yelena's job offer.  "So I helped out their friend and now i'm going to Poland to kill some woman.  There's so many red flags popping up from this that maybe I should reconsider going.  Then again... i'm out of money and down to my last month of lease.  I haven't heard from Raymond in awhile either.  Might have no choice but to go.  If this goes south, I can always slip away again.  It's not like I owe them anything."  There Anders sits by himself in heavy thought.  Lost in the game of pros and cons that he was mentally playing.  Eventually he got bored and decided to lose himself in Arc's soundtrack instead.

[Mercy Merchant]

Yelena wakes up early in the morning.  The memories of the previous night are strong for her and she looks over at Marco, almost surprised that he is still with her.  His passion had blasted apart walls around her heart that had taken years to put up.  She knows that she is taking a chance, as a repeat of the betrayal in Oslo is something she does not want to contemplate, but she is willing to take the chance that Marco is not the Sax Man.  She slides out of bed and pads out to the kitchen to put the cafpot on.  When she returns, Marco is stirring and she goes to him, kissing him awake.  "Marco magnificent last night.  Yelena hope Marco not disappointed.  Yelena not feel this way ever.  Must be real.  Come, shower time then quick breakfast.  Yelena and Marco must go about day."

Yelena climbs back out of the shared bed and goes to the bathroom.  By the time the water is hot, Marco is there to share the shower.  She has showered with lovers in the past, but this time is different.  There is a different feel to the way he washes her body than anything she has experienced before.  He runs the shampoo into her long hair and allows her to wash him after she rinses off.  Yelena notices the rather strong and very obvious need he has and kneels before him under the hot water to bring him his release, swallowing everything he gives her then standing to finish washing him off.  Out of the shower, they towel each other off and finish the small bathroom chores of brushing teeth and combing hair. 

The coffee is ready by the time they dress and get to the kitchen.  Yelena notices with some degree of surprise that they have barely spoken since they got in the shower and yet it seems like they have spoken for hours.  She tells herself that this must be some sort of magic spell he is using, but she does not care.  As they leave, the apartment, Yelena turns to him and kisses him in the hallway.  "Yelena take Marco PI Man.  Then pick up Decker mage.  Yelena has appointment Ink Palace to add heads.  Then Yelena talk with Firefly.  Hope real talk.  Much woman to woman chat.  Marco tell Yelena when pick up at Jedadiah."

They get on the Scorpion and Yelena drives him to where he is to meet with the PI man.  She waves at Jedadiah as she pulls away and drives to meet Firefly.  She greets the young woman and says, "Ready for ink?  Pick out tattoo.  Yelena buy if decker mage find one like."  Yelena laughs at the expression on Firefly's face and she guns the bike away from the garage and on to the tattoo parlor.

[ismilealot]

The day is colder than it has been and windy and the wind blasting past her has her frozen in minutes. But, not to frozen to not notice a junky blissed out at a corner and Yelena feels the pull. The siren call of drugs that can do for her what nothing else can.

Arc wakes up to a full day of activities Jaime already up and moving. He's making breakfast in the kitchen and the moment the smell hit her nostrils a wave of nausea hits her.

[Mercy Merchant]

Yelena senses more than sees the junkie passed out at the corner.  The Bliss calls to her, testing her will to ignore it.  She stops the bike and turns to look at the man.  The demons call out to her soul, promising strength and power and happiness forever.  Firefly punches Yelena in the arm, "No, Yelena-Sensei.  Drive on.  Just drive on."  Yelena still hesitates and the young decker mage hits her again.  "Time for that later.  They will not ink your heads if you are high."

Yelena stops to think on that and the shadow waits to see if she is strong enough to get past the craving.  Yelena growls into the icy wind.  "Drug not get Yelena this time."  She guns the accelerator and continues on to the Ink Palace.

[SgtBoomCloud]

With the party winding down, Arc noted that the Howlers seemed to be itching to move on, as well as most of the crew present.  Firefly wasn't talking much, but Yelena seemed over that.  A brief look between herself and the Russian indicated that Arc wanted to know more, and to keep in touch on it, but she let them go do their thing.  Turning to Anders, she grabbed a datachip, slotting it to her jack and loading some info on it.  "If ya gon' be rolling with us, best you able to get in touch wit' ush, eh?  Here's m' commcode, along with the deets to get to thish place without shtepping on the local turf.  Y'all can stay here long as you need, jusht don't try to wreck the place.  Can't quite remember where I set the bombsh, don't want them going off, ahaha~"  With a wink, she turned back to Feathers, who just seemed content to eat and drink.  Clapping a hand to his arm, she hugged him.  "Glad you back omae...don't shcare us like that again, eh?"

When she called the cab, and her ganger friends realized it was so she could go see her Vrukart tonight, she was met with a series of whistles and teasing hollers, being jostled like before.  Grinning and shaking it off, she grabbed her coat as she stepped out into the snowy evening to meet the cab, groaning as she resolved to get a vehicle...tomorrow.  The cab was short, the music bad, but eventually she did make it home, dinner in hand and a Jaime to greet her.  Dropping the bag, she rushed to embrace him, going to kiss him...and accidentally poking his cheek with a tusk!  The look of shock and surprise on his face was something priceless to behold as she was held at arm's length, hand on her chin to hold her to the light to see better.  She had a toothy grin on as she lifted her hands.  "Whaddya think?"

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Well, that was a fun night...  Arc thought to herself as she awoke....not groggy this time, not weary, just awoke.  That was what hit her first....she wasn't tired.  At all. And that was even considering how late she stayed up.  Even after the lovely evening with Jaime, Arc just couldn't quite go to sleep.  Restless, and not wanting to disturb the sleeping form next to her, she simply spent a few hours on the Trix, gaming or what have you.  Eventually, she did sleep...only to wake up a few hours later, fully refreshed.

Smiling, she realized her Vrukart was awake...and making breakfast by the smell of it.  Smells like...sausage and eggs....oh FRAG   Her smile was quickly replaced as she went pale, feeling very green as her stomach felt like it rolled over on itself.  Getting up didn't help things either as she groaned, feeling dizzy for a moment as she stumbled to the bathroom to relieve her nausea.  He must have heard it too, for when she came up for air he was in the doorframe.  Panting, she had a weary look on her face as she held up a finger, retching again.  "Hnn...Brotherton shaid..huu...might be a shide effect...huu...of the regulator in my head...huu.."  Panting, she slowly stood up and washed her hands and face, blushing a bit as she fought down the sensation.  "Good morning otherwise~"

[gilga]

Marco was quiet at the meet, he felt conflicted about this entire run and the awful people that placed people in cages. "How could they actually do that without anybody knowing?" He thought to himself. When Yelena was ready to go he said his goodbyes and rode with her. To his surprise she did not want some night out - but the couple went straight to the apartment to have sex like they never did before, to make love.

"Marco.  Is Yelena.  Is real Yelena.  Yelena ready to say in love.  Ready to give chance.  Is Marco?  Yelena can be tiger in bed, can roll over all furniture.  Be wild.  Be sexy.  But tonight Yelena want be Yelena.  Yelena want Marco talk love.  Want Marco make love Yelena.  Not just sex.  Frantic later.  Love now.  Yelena make sense?"

Marco looked at Yelena and said nothing, he did not need the mindlink spell, he looked at her and softly kissed her, tasting her lips as if they were some very expansive delicacy. "I love you too, very much" He said when they took a pause.

In the morning Marco showed her the hidden chamber he used to store guns and other sensitive things, there was a big one in the closet behind a variety of clothes. As well smaller chamber under the bed where Marco kept his crusader. "Feel free to keep your stuff in there as well." He said.

When Yelena suggested leaving Marco made it perfectly clear: "Yelena, I love you but I am not leaving this place without a nutritious breakfast. Jed does not actually eats - he feeds himself. I need tomatoes, zucchini I need cheese and an actual coffee... I would love to make you a breakfast if you allow it." 

 

[Mercy Merchant]

Yelena looks at Marco.  "Not time eat and take to PI Man.  Yelena pick decker mage up at 0800.  Go Ink Palace.  Can eat if Marco take cab."