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I didn\'t get much sleep last night… and believe you me, it wasn\'t for the lack of trying or wanting. Early morning, I tried to play it off otherwise, but Amanda was just far too sharp wit to be hoodwinked by it, that, and eyeliner wasn\'t exactly the best excuse to explain away the black bulging wrinkly bags I had under my eyes.

Maybe if I was emo it\'d fit, perhaps she might have helped me darken it blacker too… damn, why do I have to be so boring?

Home was but a long, silent carpool away. Amanda and I didn\'t talk much throughout the journey, last night\'s incident was still too much of a lingering imprint afresh in our minds. When we drove by the park, none of us two could resist briefly sifting through the shrubbery and trees for any sign of a distinct purple flutter amiss within the greens.

"I\'m sorry last night wasn\'t the award night you were looking for," I said to her after a while of silence. "Somehow, someway, there always seems to be something that gets in the way." 

"Ah well..." Amanda breathed lightly. "Fun while it lasted."

"You deserved better."

Here I was, an earnest apology, heart on my sleeve, and all she could do was snort at me.

"What could be better?" She said. "Dinner, video games, spending time together alone in each other\'s arms… by candlelight even. I\'m telling you, Romeo and Juliet\'s got nothing on us."

Shortly after, we were pulling up to my driveway, and she left me off with a departing kiss on the cheek, to which I quickly reciprocated with one on the lips instead.

"For the road," I told her, planting my feet on the pavement.

"Better just got better..." She said, smiling, before driving off to do whatever it is an Amanda does in their spare time.

It had only struck an early nine when I walked up to my porch, and it was there that I was promptly stopped in place by an obstruction between the door and I sitting there by the steps…  one that shouldn\'t even be there in the first place, if prior knowledge holds true.

I sighed. "Okay, I\'m starting to think you guys are just lying to the world about the whole \'aversion to sunlight\' thing."

There were short narrow grooves etched onto the floorboards now, and more were still being made - her shape nails gliding effortlessly through the timbered surface like a hot knife through butter.

"Stop doing that," I said firmly. "You don\'t have a job to pay for the repairs."

She glanced up at me - those dark, harsh eyes of hers, those pointed fangs - now that I think about it, these vampires are kinda like feral cats.

Except at least, a cat would be far more likely to actually listen to you for once.

Amelia continued to scratch away at my porch. 

"Once I feel like it," She said.

Whatever. I had more pressing things at the moment to bother with her antics… in fact, this was convenient timing, finally, I got someone with answers in front of me.

"For someone who claims to want to keep an eye on me, you\'re not very good at it," I said to her, feeling like a Mom at the start of a lecture. "You know I was looking for you yesterday?

"My sister had indeed mentioned it to me in passing, yes, as did your Elf moments later, and as did your sister too, just early this morning, although with much apprehension," She said, keeping ever as indifferent as she was infuriating. "After all that, I daresay I know far too much about your keenness. Why do you suppose I\'m here, unjustifiably slaving away beneath the scorching heat anyway?"

What then? Is her scratching up the property\'s resale value all the way to the ground her way of spiting me for it then?

"Could have just waited for me inside," I said.

"You wanted to see me," She nudged slightly forward, an inch away from the sun. "Here I am."

Fine, suit yourself…

"What\'s going on?" I asked, arms crossed against one another. "And just get to the point, please. You know already what I\'m talking about."

At that, her fangs began to show a little more, a glint through a faint smirk forming. "Yes, I suppose I do. Your Elf\'s had pressed me for details no doubt just as much as you will too." 

"So you know already that Jay showed up out of the blue in front of us, in front of my sister, almost putting her in harm\'s way?"

Rarely, I\'ve ever heard her laugh, but sometimes when the stars align, much like herself, her laughter was just as bone-chilling and evil.

"In harm\'s way?" She chuckled even more. "The only risk of danger to her is herself. The magic I sense stirring within her - I confess, even my own, even at my best, pales in comparison to her at her worst."

"Point still stands," I said. "Jay showed up, bastard shook Sammy\'s hand, name-dropped Irene, refused to elaborate, and was gone within the minute."

"And so I\'ve heard," Amelia said, her gaze dull and weary. "Believe me, your Elf spared me no expenses with the details of the day prior."

"So what the hell is going on then?" I asked again. "Irene\'s doing something, probably doesn\'t want me to know about it, sends you after me just in case, so she can have the green light to go snooping worry-free."

"Oh, well there you go, your question with its answer, promptly given," She proclaimed with a whimsical flick of the wrist. "I could not have worded it any better myself even if I tried."

"I\'m not done," I said, stopping in place just as she only began to rise. "I might know the what, but you know the why, so tell me why."

"Why what?"

"Why I\'m kept in the dark about all this."

"Really?" She raised an unimpressed brow. "Is love really that elusive of a reason to you for that Succubus to want to keep you out of harm\'s way?"

"I\'ve always been in harm\'s way anyway."

"Yes, indeed, and just what in every instance do you have to show for it?" She rebutted. "Death in one, and at the brink of it once more in every other. Of course she wishes to exempt you from any more instances like those."

"The first one\'s on you though, don\'t forget."

"Yes, well…" Amelia shrugged, shifting her gaze sideways, looking just a wince awkward there. "Point still stands..."

"And about Jay…"

"Oh, by the Divines, you\'re like an annoying fly," She stood up, fingers pressing against her temple. "I grow weary of this… I sense you believe that I hold the truth to this bothersome Magus\' true intentions?"

I nodded. "Everything you\'ve done so far keeps implying that you do."

"Then, remorsefully, I must sadly inform you that you\'ve misinterpreted," She said with a tone empty of any meaning. "I know no more than you do."

"I don\'t believe that."

"Believe what you wish, then," She snapped at me. "But know that the extent of my knowledge lies only with an unfortunate stray victim to this Magus\' ambition."

"Victim?" I cocked my head at her. "What victim?"

"A man," Amelia began, then immediately corrected herself. "Well, not anymore a man, if the detective\'s claim rings true. In which case, a puppet, subordinate, a willing soul in his likeness would be the more accurate terms here."

Was I the only one lost here, or was this making sense to anyone else? Seriously, it feels like half the people I know have a severe addiction to speaking in riddles.

Is there a rehabilitation center somewhere where I can just drop them off for the weekend, or maybe two?

"You got a term that\'s in English, perhaps?" I asked.

She gave me a look, a disappointed, condescending look, as if what she was spouting out was simply elementary.

Well sorry, Amelia… I ain\'t your dear Watson.

"A parasite," She said. "Surely even you must know what that is, yes?"

Yeesh, what a gremlin.

"Of course I do," I said. "But what do you mean? Are you saying Jay infected someone with a -"

"Ah, I\'m weary!" Amelia ruffled her long hair, a frightening scowl on her face directed squarely at the glowing ball in the sky, her expression desiring nothing more than to see it crumble to dust beneath her fist. "If you really wish to know more, then go seek out your better half instead of bugging me anymore."

"Again, I\'m casting doubts here," I said. "Sounds like you\'re just trying to avoid answering the question."

"Again, you are free to believe what you wish," She slowly turned that scowl over to me, and that desire too. "And I am free to do as I wish."

Mmm, bugging the irate vampire seems like a surefire way to get another instance with death… maybe I shouldn\'t do that.

Anyway, and with that, she spun around, seeking refuge inside, opening the door, and glancing at me only once briefly to say, "Besides, I\'ve no doubt you have more than just questions to say to her too, do you not?"

Finally, for once. something we both are of the same mind on. Things were starting to unfold too…

We got a victim, a mystery ambition, and a parasite.

What victim? What ambition? What parasite?

The more answers I receive, the more questions I have…

I do hope Irene came more prepared than Amelia did when it came to being bugged.

A fly\'s about to come buzzing.