Some Sick Friendship [PG13]

[ωΘĿƒ]

White opened the sleek, gold-rimmed glass doors to the Cabaret, shoving past the initial guards without so much as a gesture to them.

They knew when he was coming, and what he was doing when he got to the Cabaret. Vampire powers were useful that way, and although he wasn't the foremost expert on them, he knew the gist of what they did, and that had always been good enough for him. He had admittedly done very well without knowing a whole hellova lot about vampires in general.

They drank blood. They slept during the day. They didn't like light. Basic stuff. He'd never bothered to go into all that fancy **** like telepathy and scaling walls without a ladder. He just did things as he had always done them, and whatever he learned along the way stuck with him. Like for instance, he had figured out a while back that vampires could be affected by much the same stuff that humans could in terms of drugs.

Thus the alcohol and tobacco business, and thus him ending up here. All in all, this vampire **** turned out to be a pretty neat bargain for him. Eternal life. Eternal pleasure. That's some damn good life.

White pulled through the crowd of people inhabiting his Cabaret tonight. He could usually tell the regulars, and there were a lot of regulars. For some reason people liked doing illegal crap. Must have some kind of allure to it, because this place was always more crowded than the cafe.

Not bothering to see if Ivy had made it through the throng, White made it all the way up to the back door of the Cab, muttering a few words of command to the guards and then sliding in through the narrow entrance.

There was a long hall. Lots of rooms. White went down the list of uses for each one, and eventually found the one for his specific illegal activity. Going up to the third room down, White threw the door open and gestured for Ivy to enter it.

"Here we are," he took a sip of the glass he'd brought with him from the cafe, by now finishing off the last of it. "One room of 'something stronger.' I don't know what they have where you come from, but here there are a lot of choices."

[Iƪƪia]

Ivy gladly followed her guide throw the crowd of people occupying what appeared to be a glorified cat house. Well, it was an awfully expensive-looking cat house, he'd give it that... Matter of fact, she wouldn't mind stopping by here in the future and catching a show or two. Bot now was not the time for that. She had a specific reason for being here.

As she shoved her way through the crowd, the little corner of her mind that was still functioning properly noticed how this guy seemed to be a sort of leader to the others here. Perhaps she would have put more thought into this if the rest of her brain wasn't so focused on getting as ****ed up as possible tonight. Drugs and alcohol won over mild curiosity like this every time.

She stumbled down the hall after him, smiling and chuckling all the way until she came to the door he held open. She entered without a moment's hesitation. Hands clasped behind her back, she still swayed from side to side a little, a side-effect from all that alcohol.

"Heh, damn s'been a long time since I've had anythin'. I plan on blackin' out tonight in cebration."

Perhaps if someone else had rescued after spending 100 years alone in a frozen wasteland, they would have been grateful for the second chance. They might have tried to turn their life around. They might have tried to do good in the world; make a difference. Ivy, on the other hand, had always been content with her life. There was never anything she felt like she should change, so why try to change it now? They let her live once again, so she just intended to have as much fun as possible. And what was more fun than getting high to the point where the ceiling starts talking to you about the floor's evil plans to conquer the walls and take over the building? Nothing, that's what!

[ωΘĿƒ]

White was pretty happy with how this whole thing had played out.

It had started out one of those ****ed up nights where Crane wanted to ***** so he had to sit there and take it while simultaneously not getting himself too drunk and stoned... and then this girly comes along with her odd little habits and her feverish need to get as wasted as possible as fast as possible... and he dare say he just forgot all about Crane's *****ing.

He forgot about all this plotting evil bullcrap and just decided to ride the wave Ivy had created. Not a bad gig for him. He hoped she liked her stay and came back a bit more. He could always use another excuse to get drunk. And now she was going for the stronger stuff too. She didn't even blink as he let her down the layers of security into this nicely private room.

Some of the ones that follow him in here... they're so damn scared. Why the hell would they be scared? Well yeah, he was something of a manipulative, opportunistic, soulless bastard; but hey, he enjoyed life as much as the next guy. It really did rub him the wrong way when someone finally decided to speak up and go for the illegal ****, and then they shivered like a whimp all the way down here.

Drives a man crazy...

White waited until Ivy was inside the room completely before he went in himself and shut the door behind them. He set his empty glass on a nearby table, and proceeded to focus more on his cigar - which by the way was almost spent too.

Puffing out a new blue haze for White to immerse himself in, he found somewhere comfortable to sit and churned out smoke like a chimney for a minute or two before even uttering a word.

"Alright, so let's start you off with..."

He scanned the room, looking for something to put her in the blackout that she described. The walls were lined with various things, most of which were shelves with little drawers in them. They were all meticulously labeled, and the contents could really only be left up to the imagination.

Suffice to say, they weren't cubbyholes. White pointed to one on the far side of the room near the center of the wall, taking his cigar and tipping it over the edge of the couch where he could tap the ashes into a nicely decorated ashtray. Replacing the cigar to it's rightful place, White murmured something barely audible.

"That one'll do."

[Iƪƪia]

Taking a seat, Ivy brought her knees up to her chest, hugging them close to her. She was smiling like an excited, little kid, looking around the room with a sort of inordinate curiosity. It looked like the Valkyrie had done a good job in bringing them here. Yeah, sure the rest of this world must a really wonderful place and all that ****, but she doubted there were many places where one could get free drugs... Or maybe there were. Maybe she could travel the world, try a different drug in every place she'd visit. That'd be one hell of a trip.

Looking at the mass of shelves and drawers, she couldn't help but imagine what was in them. If each one held something different... Damn, they really did have a much bigger selection that her world did. It was always 'smoke this, chew on that'... Sometimes the same old **** got pretty boring after awhile. Of course, boredom never stopped her from doing it, but still. It would have been nice to have some variety.

When he finally spoke, she focused her attention completely on him, or as much attention as her drunken mind could manage, at least. It wasn't as if she were fixated on him, but he did promise her a blackout, and she was all too eager for that.

She looked toward where he pointed, nodding impatiently. Why did she have to "start off" with anything, anyway? Couldn't she just go straight to the meanest, most ****ed up **** they had? That would guarantee a blackout, to be sure...

[ωΘĿƒ]

Gauging her reaction in a blink, White dropped the pointed hand to again sit back and take a few more deep breaths of his cigar.

Hmm. She was really into this. She didn't just want a high. She wanted the most ****ed up thing he had. Well, he could see that from the booze she selected, but still there was that small chance that, as full of hopeless abandon as she was, she would back down once they got to the time to decide.

That wasn't true. She really didn't care. She wanted it all. Not just the stronger stuff. She wanted the strongest stuff.

A small, almost imperceptible smile crept across White's face. Well hell, she could really die from that kind of ****, but if she wanted it...

He'd never stop her. After all, there was a little something in it for him too.

Now feeling just a bit of that tenacious energy of the girl, White hurried his chain smoking and scanned through the rows of labels looking for just the right one. And there it was. His favorite. Not just because it was the strongest but...

Well hell. Yeah, because it was the strongest.

White, instead of pointing, got up himself to open the drawer for the girl.

"Alright. Change of plan. Why don't we just skip the kid stuff and get to the good ****."

Still, as much as her jumpy kind of vibe was getting to him, he wanted to learn a few more things about her little culture. How about, what kind of drugs they were into?

And more importantly, did she know what she was doing in a place like this? Or was this just another junkie that much in search of a fix. Had to make sure about these things. Just in case well... She had no idea what she was doing, and she ended up dead.

Which was a hellova lot of work for him to bury the body. Not to mention the waste of a perfectly good breather...

After opening the drawer, White stepped aside, allowing her to try out the stuff as she wished.

He puffed out a blue ring of smoke before speaking again.

"Go ahead. Take it. Let's see how you do."

[Iƪƪia]

As he got up and walked to a different drawer, Ivy nearly slid off of her seat in excitement. He finally got it. She wasn't here to play games; wasn't here to take her time and sample everything he had. She was here because she hadn't been so thoroughly ****ed up in years, and she was way beyond due. You'd think that the type of liquor she chose to drink would have been a big clue, but maybe she should have been more forward.

After he opened the drawer, she immediately jumped to her feet and removed the contents. Falling back into her chair, Ivy examined the objects she held in her hands. There was something familiar about this, and yet different at the same time. For example, they'd used pipes back in her world as well, but never one that looked this strange. Well, she supposed the mechanics were still the same.

Placing a generous amount of the substance in the end, she lit it with a match and then proceeded to take one, long drag. As if she were uncertain if that would do the trick or not, she held her breath in for a moment before allowing the smoke to flow out of her mouth as she fell back into the chair, her body limp, staring up at the ceiling.

She was suddenly very lightheaded, and her muscles felt unusually tired. In other words: that **** was ****ing amazing! She could barely get her mind to work at all, but she still managed to form a sentence as a sudden wave of energy hit her, causing her to sit up straight.

"****, man! Just... ****! An' here I thought you were holdin' out on me. Naw, but this stuff is... Just ****, ya know! Reminds me of home, it does, 'cept it took me a lot longer to find quality drugs, it did. It was always worth it, though. A girl needs more than alcohol and cigarettes every now and then, right? Yeah, sometime's I'd find some stupid kid actually willing to share with me, but other time's I'd have to-"

Her rapid speech was abruptly cut off as she moved the pipe up to her lips again, taking another, long drag, only to fall back, listlessly, once again. No thoughts, barely in control of her movements. That was what a good drug was supposed to do. Hopefully she'd start hallucinating next. That was always her favorite part. She'd met some really interesting creatures like that.

[ωΘĿƒ]

White leaned against the wall of drawers, on occasion dabbing the spend end of the cigar onto a nearby ashtray, or taking a small sample of the smoke and letting it out through his nose.

Yup. She knew how to do ****. And by the sound of it, she knew it almost as well as he did.

Well, probably better in a manner of speaking. White didn't do drugs. Not one bit. Not a shoot up or a smoke at all. Just alcohol and the classic tobacco every night. Nothing more. And that was the beauty of it. He really wasn't doing anything illegal himself, aside from his lovely cigar he was smoking right now.

Or those damn lovely guns he had in the back room. But hell, if you were counting those...

Nope. White was clean, in a manner of speaking. But hell, just because he didn't do them didn't mean he didn't like the ****. He loved it. All of it. Just, in a different way.

And that was also the beauty of this place, with its many rooms and its many levels of sin and frivolity. It was a veritable funhouse, and a ****ing good one too. But none of it was for him.

So why, you ask, build something so magnificent as the Colleger Cabaret and spare no expense in the making and importing of all the various goodies it required?

Well... That part was coming up. But he had to wait a bit first. Had to let Ivy simmer.

He puffed a bit at the cigar, but it wasn't the calm, leisurely way that he had done it before. Now he was just using it to hold him off for a bit.

Finding it boring standing against the wall of drawers, he slid himself into a more comfortable chair next to Ivy, sitting back and twirling the cigar around between his fingers impatiently.

Damn... he hated waiting. But it would pay off. Real soon. It would be all worth this ****ing patience.

[Iƪƪia]

Mere moments after taking that first hit, the full effects were starting to set in. Ivy would look around the room, seeing everything so out of focus, as if it was all obscured in a strange fog. Then, there would be a moment of clarity again, where everything would come into perfect focus. Beyond perfect focus. She saw dimensions that weren't even there. Every now and then an object would expand or shrink in size, or even disappear completely in a flash of white light, and Ivy watched all of this with fascination.

It wasn't like it was something new. She'd seen this type of thing plenty of times, and it only got stranger. However, it never became commonplace. Every little thing: the way tiny worm holes would appear in the walls, the way the lights would hurl themselves right at her before stopping in mid-air and returning to their posts, the way her fingernails would grow at such an abnormally fast rate; it was all so ****ing fascinating.

She took another drag off of the pipe before resting her head on the back of her chair and looking up at the ceiling again. Tipping her head in curiosity, her eyes were following the movement of something that wasn't really there while her arms went up slowly, batting at the empty air, like a cat with an invisible toy.

What was that thing? What was it doing? The snake-like body seemed to be slithering out of the wall as it then proceeded to writhe across the ceiling. It had a horn like a unicorn's protruding from the middle of its head that it used to tap on the ceiling in certain spots. It was looking for something, and it didn't look like her friend could see or hear the creature. Well, she should probably tell him.

"There's a... Um. There's a- a snake. There. It's- I dunno what it's- But you should probably- Oh. Wait a minute, I think it's friendly."

She smiled up as the snake gave her a weird, toothy smile before continuing to slide across the ceiling. It slid all the way across and out through the other wall. As she waved goodbye, she suddenly realized what it had been doing. It was hunting. There were magic rats in those walls, the Unicorn Snake's food of choice. Poor beast was just hungry.

Bringing the pipe up to her lips, she inhaled once again. Perhaps there was other wildlife to be seen as well.

[ωΘĿƒ]

So there it was. Lain out before him again. As it always was for him.

There wasn't a specific reason he did this. As ****ed up as he was, he wasn't specifically crazy about drugs. Or about much of anything for that matter. It was all shades of boring, ****ing, useless gray. Besides guns, that is.

Guns were his life. They really were the only things that he had any distinction towards, especially now that he was getting on in years, and getting less and less interested in things in general. This was just fun. Something to do in the meantime, and hell he knew how to have a ****ing good meantime. So he sat in his chair, sprawled out boredly and lifelessly like a statue, or like a rag doll; without so much as an ounce of energy to his name. And he waited and watched as Ivy twitched and mumbled things in her chair.

Not a bit of interest in doing this, but it was kind of funny. Hell, anything was funny when he was this drunk. He kind of chuckled to himself silently, without making any real noise, but going through the small motions of laughing none the less. When she started to talk about snakes or something, he knew it was about time he should probably get this over with.

White flicked the remnants of his cigar across the room, bothering himself to sit up straight and pull his chair a bit closer to Ivy's. The way they were made, the cylindrical chairs had a nice, thick rim of connected head and arm rests in kind of a circular arc along the back. The seat of the chairs were just a big, comfortable pillow, and was great if you may be incapacitated enough to just lie there for awhile. The head/arm rest arc was slanted just so, allowing you to lie back and stare at the ceiling like Ivy had been doing so much. It was all pretty damn comfortable, if White didn't say so himself, but the comfort wasn't the reason he got the chairs.

Now unlocking Ivy's chair at the metal base, White swirled her around so she was facing the other direction, hair flung back over the arc like some kind of silky waterfall.

Pulling the hair aside, White leaned down low over the edge of the arc, first making sure Ivy was checked out of reality right now and wouldn't give a **** what happened to her, then tilting her head away from him a few inches.

Her eyes looked glazed over; dead almost, but they were shifting, so he could tell she was still looking at whatever it was she could see. He held her head to the side lightly, just enough so that she wouldn't move and screw up his aim, then he took a good bite and let the taste flood through him.

It was kind of the same thing as she was doing, but it was a little different. It took a few more seconds to kick in, because he had to get the blood flowing enough to where it actually did something, and he couldn't take too much and kill her because then where the hell would he get another draw from? It was all kind of tricky, and it only worked if you didn't kill the person you were feeding from, but he'd had enough test drives to where he knew what he was doing. It was like instinct now.

Now, without noticing it White slid off his chair so he was closer to her, wrapping his arms around her shoulders to keep her still as he took a nice, long draw. When he was done, he slid back effortlessly, falling back in his own chair and lolling his head back in much the same way she had.

Just the smallest bit of a smile still on his face, he let the warmth and the lethargy seep in, gluing him to his seat with an apathetic calm while his head felt like it was floating away.

Now that was some good ****... He was kinda happy he set her up with the stronger stuff now.

[Iƪƪia]

Ivy had resigned herself to watching the colorful swirls dance across the ceiling. They had appeared shortly after the Unicorn Snake left, and they would swirl and spin more and more tightly into a little circle until they disappeared into nothingness. It was some freaky ****. It also left her completely oblivious to the rest of the world.

It felt as though she were flying for a moment as her chair moved beneath her, but as soon as she was stationary, she located those swirls again. Now they were trying to actually spell out words... Holy ****! They were trying to communicate with her! However, they were only spelling out the letters 'U' and 'O'. Now, what could that mean in Rainbow Swirl language?

Her mind then sensed as someone got closer to her. Much closer. Although her body was too numb to give a damn. Instead, she turned her head as much as she was able to, looking at the wall, effectively ignoring the slight pressure she felt on her neck. There was more important **** to be thinking about, anyway.

One by one, little, purple rats were slipping out from underneath the wall. As they made it through, they stood up on their two hind feet to continue their march. The lead rat seemed to be carrying a sort of really tiny spear. Oh, ****! It was a ****ing invasion! They were making a preemptive strike now that Unicorn Snake - whom she had affectionately nicknamed Unis - had left. The bastards.

"Hm... Well, that's fine," She mumbled as she finally noticed his arms wrap around her shoulders, "But you should really do somethin' about that goddamn rat infestation."

After he moved away and there was nothing left to hold her up, Ivy slid halfway down her chair, the pipe she had still held loosely in her hand finally falling to the floor. She continued to slide off of her seat until she was just about kneeling on the floor with her head resting on the seat cushion when she realized what had happened. It was those ****ing rats! They were using some kind of magic on her to bring her to the floor so that they could punch a hole in her skull and nest in her brains. After all, everyone knew that Chimera brain matter was a natural repellent to Unicorn Snakes.

"****ers... Not goin' out like that," She growled, shaking her fist in the rats' general direction as she fell sideways to the floor. Her hair was completely covering her face and she couldn't see a damn thing through it which reminded her that she'd have to cut it soon. At least it was keeping the rats at bay for now.

[ωΘĿƒ]

Letting the oh so familiar feel of that warmth with it's spiked aftertaste drip down through him and cover him, White lay back on his chair lifelessly until he could feel nothing but a pleasant, fuzzy vibration echo throughout his entire frame. It was numb, but it was also warm too.

The warmth was nice. He didn't feel it often enough.

But the numbness was better. So much better. And then the way everything looked and felt got so ****ed up, it always made him laugh. Hysterically. It was all very funny, and he just couldn't stop laughing about it.

That light, airy feeling generating from around his head got lighter, if it was ever able to. It got airier and, aw hell, whatever else it did to make it feel so... good. So good just as it was, and no other way. Until he felt another way and that way was just good too.

It was all good, but then he wouldn't have it any other way until it changed... And changed... And kept changing...

Did it keep changing? It was hard to tell after a while, and then after a longer while he just didn't give a ****. It all worked. All the colors and patterns and the funny little... things all over the place. All of it was just... good.

Which was about the span of the circular, spiraling pattern he was in when eventually he just slipped down the drain completely and it got black. Very black. And everything was quiet.

Everything was only quiet when he passed out, because otherwise he could hear things. People breathing in the next room, the bugs crawling along the ground. It was all so loud and goddamn distracting when you were trying to sleep, except when he was like this and then there was just nothing.

And the nothing was... good.

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

When White finally sifted up from wherever the hell his head went when he slept, he felt goddamn awful. And since he was such a goddamn sharp tool in the box, he was aware incrementally of how ****ed up he felt as he slowly gained consciousness. That lasted for about five minutes, him slowly drifting up and then down again, and up and down, up and down, until he just got sick of it and shot upright in bed.

Wait... bed? Where did the bed come from? And ****... why did his head hurt worse than normal?

Oh. Right. Yeah. That.

White scrubbed his hands through his hair, as if he could massage out the damn headache that had settled down and made a goddamn family in his frontal lobe. After trying that out unsuccessfully, he just reached over to the nightstand on the right and unscrewed the lid to his favorite hangover cure, ready made.

After downing half the strange cocktail of room-temperature blood with pureed vegetables and a dash of hard liquor, White screwed the cap back on an chucked it carelessly back onto the nightstand.

After that point, he kind of noticed something was wrong about this morning. Something other than the occasional hangover, which in reality wasn't all that abnormal.

...where the hell was his shirt? And pants?

Just beginning to feel the effects of that headache become more manageable, White looked around with a mild curiosity, taking in his surroundings.

Hmmm. Must have slept with someone. The mystery was, who?

And looking right next to him, he solved that mystery. Ivy. Hmmmm. Didn't see that one comin'. Though... Kinda wasn't a stretch either. He had kinda liked the girl. In more than one way. What the hell kind of chimera was she again? Something with some pretty spicy blood...

Must be that whole body switching thing. Gave her a unique flavor. Well hell, he should try that sometime. Make a profit.

...and then his headache took a baseball bat to his head, and he winced in pain and got up before it decided to start on a round three.

He swiped the remedy from the nightstand again, but it really was better if you had it fresh. He'd have to go to the cafe or the Cabaret bars to get any of the ingredients. ****!

Deciding to make the journey across the huge, heavily decorated room, White got up to go find something to wear. He ended up with his usual - a tailored suit bottom and a plain shirt with a nice old smoking jacket. It was only after he had gotten the bottom on and was buttoning up the shirt that the thought of Ivy crossed his mind again.

Well... these things often have an order. "Cure for hangover" was definitely before "that girl you slept with last night." In fact, "getting dressed so you weren't so ****ing cold" took precedence over "that girl you slept with last night."

All in all, that girl, and whatever might have happened, happened last night. Not right now. Right now was at the ****ing top of the list.

Besides, she looked fine. Hopefully. She hadn't seemed dead or anything when he woke up, and he was pretty sure he hadn't left her bleeding last night during their little party.

Oooohh.... That's how he got in here. He kept the gauze in here. ****, had to remember these things. He couldn't ****ing go senile on himself yet.

Still... he just had to make sure. Even though he was pretty sure she wasn't dead, it sucked to leave dead things rotting in the bed. Could never get that smell out. And hell, he hoped even if she was dead that it was due to that ****ing awesome **** she did and not him. He hated to change the goddamn sheets after girls bled out all over them.

Now dropping the empty container at its final resting place back where it had started, White grabbed his jacket and went back to the bed, sitting down on it so that he could put his shoes on.

"Some night, eh?" he smiled, noting that she was breathing as he pulled the laces to one of his shoes tight.

[Iƪƪia]

When Ivy began to slowly slip back into consciousness, she was aware of the dull, consistent throbbing in her head. She didn't open her eyes, rather she shut them all the more tightly, gritting her teeth against the pain as she forced herself to go back to sleep. After all, she knew if she got up that pain would see it an the perfect opportunity to hit her even harder.

When she noticed someone stirring beside her, she suddenly became aware of several facts. One was that she was in a bed, laying on her stomach with her face burried in a pillow. The second was that she was naked and the third was that she was sharing this bed with someone else. Even Ivy in her hungover confusion could connect these facts together. And it was just drunken, stoned, casual sex with... Someone. No big deal. It happened often enough in the past.

As she became more and more aware she tried to piece last night together to little avail. Must have been one hell of a night then. If she didn't remember a damn thing that could only mean that she had gotten plenty of what she was after. Although as to what else happened she could only guess. It must have been something different, because she felt... Weird. She couldn't really describe the feeling, it was just strange. Not to mention how she felt weaker than usual. Awfully sore too, she decided as her hand went up to rub her neck, confused.

When she heard a familiar voice from beside her, she finally decided to crack open her eyes, tipping her head so that she could look up at him. Oh, okay. Now things made a little more sense. But just a little. How and why they had come here was still a mystery to her. But last night was shrouded in mystery, it seemed.

"Oh, hey... I remember you," She muttered sleepily, closing her eyes and turning away again, "You're th' guy from th' bar."

And that's the best she could come up with. No name. No recollection of what they had done. Nothing. Whatever she'd tried last night she would have to try that **** again. Soon. Really, what a ****ing awesome blackout.

The only thing that would put her in a bad mood now was that ****ing headache. Man, she needed a drink now. If only she had her trusty flask... Ah well, she'd just have to buy a new one. She highly doubted that they'd be hard to find around here.

[ωΘĿƒ]

White chuckled at what Ivy had said, though not too loudly because everything was so goddamn loud right now and the ****ing superhuman hearing wasn't helping that out a lot. Still, he thought it was funny. For some reason - possibly the centuries of getting drunk or possibly because he wasn't human - he could remember a bit more than the average junkie/drunk about their junkie/drunkenness. It may be a gift, or it may just ****ing be annoying to remember things so clearly, but whatever it was he could completely recall all the events pretty much leading up to... um... the room? Yeah. That room they went into.

Then it was all a nice blank slate. Just the way it should be. And now all he had were the facts about his night just before the moment leading up to that blackout.

Illia was dead. Ivy had replaced her. He had no ****ing clue how, but Ivy was now in Illia's body. Ivy was a better person overall than Illia. White appreciated this fact and as a consequence got to have a bit more fun last night than he normally would.

Now realizing something about this whole ordeal, White had to stop laughing or risk getting louder which would benefit no one in the room currently.

"Girly, I'm not the guy from the bar; I'm the ****ing bartender. And you know what? I just remembered you have a boyfriend. Damn, that's pretty funny. First I shoot the guy in the back then I **** his girl."

White pulled on a sock, then finished his dressing before he continued.

"That's hilarious."

Ah damn. Now was the time to remind himself how much he loved being dead. So much ****ing fun, it was probably a sin.

Scratch that. It was all the goddamn sins put together, which made it that much more fun to think about. But now... wasn't the time to think. White winced again as his headache rebounded with another blunt object to bash his head in with, and quickly decided on the course of the evening.

He'd get drunk some more, then he'd get breakfast. Two birds, if he went to the Cab. And by the looks of it, Ivy needed much the same treatment to fix her up.

Actually... she should probably eat something. Losing a lot of blood like that while having a fun night was kinda ****ing dangerous, and he had finally found someone who seemed to appreciate all the best things in life as much as he did.

Not to mention she could tolerate all the best things in life. And he more than anyone else knew how ****ing important that was. It was such a damn shame to go through all the trouble of gathering up or buying some kid from somewhere only to have them keel over after the first time. Ivy was doing a lot better at this point, and she had willingly put herself through all that crap. That was nice too, not to have to fight with some dumb kid the whole way through. You'd think people would like the blissful stupors they were getting? That made Ivy something mildly important on White's list of priorities.

Which was a ****ing hard thing to do. She should really be taken care of.

"Come on. Get dressed." White said, softly, but more for his own sake than hers. "We're going drinking."

[Iƪƪia]

Ivy mumbled several choice words into the pillow, cursing him for being so loud. It had been a long night and she just wanted to go back to sleep. That was what she did, after all. Drink, smoke, pass out, sleep. Then she'd drag her ass out of bed and start the cycle all over again, although the monotony was sometimes broken by the occasional fight or the need to travel. She moved around pretty often back in her own world, leaving one town when she ran out of money or ****ed off one too many of those highrollers. You cheat them in one game and suddenly you're at the top of their hit list.

With a sigh, Ivy decided that it didn't look like she was going to be able to go back to sleep, so she turned her head and watched him through eyes half-closed.

"Going by that list of names I found I reckon she had more than one boyfriend," She mused, wondering how strange it would be to meet someone that this body had ****ed in the past.

Rolling onto her back, she brought her hands behind her head, wincing as the pounding in her head only intensified. Yeah, the hangovers always ****ing sucked but, for some reason, she didn't really seem to mind this one. Weird, but it was almost laughable. And laugh she did, though she had to quickly stop herself before she managed to make the pain any worse. Maybe this was because this was her first hangover since her death? No, probably not. She didn't do that kind of sentimental bull****. Most likely she was still kind of high from last night. She did feel lightheaded at least.

When he commanded her to get dressed, she groaned in response, rolling over again and shutting her eyes tightly. Then she caught the last of the sentence.

"Oh. Right then!"

Without another word she jumped out of bed, picking up her clothes and quickly pulling them on. She didn't bother to try to make herself look presentable, but then again she didn't really have to. Oh, but the ****ing hair... She should probably do something with it.

She reached into her pocket and pulled out a necklace. It seemed like this girl had been in love with jewelry. After all, they were everywhere. In every room, on every table in her place she was sure to find a ring or a necklace or something. And it made Ivy wonder what she should do with them now. Yeah they were pretty, but what else could you do with them? Well, she supposed she could just sell some of them. But they also had other uses too she realized, turning the necklace she had into a makeshift hair tie and pulling the horrible mess of hair back.

Once that task was accomplished, she strode past him, all too willing to start that cycle over again. Ah, it was just like home. Only there were no death threats. Yet.