Welcome to Gaia! ::

((I sincerely apologize for the lengthy delay))

Lily shook a cigarette from her pack and slipped it between her lips. She uncovered a silver Zippo that she hid in her chest region. After igniting her smoke, she slipped it back into it's safe hiding place.

She smiled through the exhale of smoke at both her conversational partners.

"Well, a girl like me can always use a drink and some stimulating company," she laughed and took a large gulp of her drink after it was set infront of her.

"It's been awhile since I've been around, and to tell you the truth? From my point of view? Things are looking quite slow around here...I miss the violence, the gore, and the misplaced hatred that made this city so interesting with so many loose cannons...looks like they've been nailed down now." Lily grinned, snickered, and continued to nurse her cigarette and accompany it with the occasional drink from her glass.

((I tried to do a little bit to make up for my lack of activity emo ((Sidebar: Did I miss them adding the Emo emoticon or do I just need to sleep? Haha)) Thank you for your patience Lord Kensington biggrin ))

A sweet smile crept across her face and just in that instant, it was almost easy to see the real little girl beneath the mountains of makeup, jewels, and clothes that she had so lovingly fashioned into an image to survive in the world. In her mind? There was no place for a fresh-faced, naive, physically 17, ex-aristocratic debutante in this business of the Underworld that she was now a part of. In the Old World, she was a doormat...more specifically, a lady of breeding with no say or consciousness to her position in the world. After losing her mortal life, it became quite evident that rules were mostly useless and knowing the difference between four different kinds of dinner forks? It wouldn't get you up the food chain. Not to mention that when figured out you had the power to nearly cleanly rip a man's head off with your bare hands, it seemed a bit disingenous to continue pretending to care what they or anyone told her to do. In the immortal world, no one was looking for the matrimonious virture of the past. An immortal life quickly makes the idea of partnering and mating with a suitable male seem like a delusional antediluvian ideal.

Lily knew that these facts set her apart in some circles. Unlike many she had met over the centuries, she harbored no disdain for her dark creation. Her sire was a tortorous and methodically insane man, but her new life had liberated her from the repression of her past. She had managed to outrun the murder of her sire, a moment in history that for her? Embodied the new found control of her body and the path that she would make for herself.

There was one issue she continued to face for centuries, actually making it to the top. The biggest example? Here she sat, in the same bar that she had drowned her sorrows in so many times before, still wearing the "spoils of war" and supporting her few finanicial desires with the petty cash stolen from the "lunchables" of the Upper East Side. She appeared as she wished, but that was always her problem...actually making her life what the appearances were modeled to imitate.

She had thought that squeezing herself into the distribution of new street drugs might be her ticket in but naturally, her vanity deterred her from doing so. She wanted respect, not to be slumming it slinging drugs on the playground to the undesirables of the races. Drugs were downtown, she wanted to be uptown...assassination, maybe? Joining the Mafia? Her own gang? Ha! The truth was, she had no idea how to make it in this world. Petty theft, charming for goods, or con-ing her way to what she wanted at any given moment? That was easy but now she was looking for respect, money, and success...that was proving to be a more difficult ball game. Pushing the girls up and flipping your hair can only get you but so far and that was becoming increasingly evident in her current reality.

"I suppose you may be right," she took another long drag and gestured to the bartender for a shot of 151. She needed a shot of optimism, and make it double. She knocked it back after it arrived and slammed it down on the bar, the urge to gag and physically react was too hard to deny. A few hundred years and one of the only things she had ever met that could get a real reaction from her was that death booze in a bottle.

Lily couldn't get another drag fast enough to try and chase away the taste. She exhaled through a grin and turned her attention to Rogue.

"Besides...I couldn't stay away from this one," Lily laughed a sweet laugh "I was getting quite attached to the 'independent women' in the city cliché." Lily laughed and waved back the bartender to refresh the drinks of this undead social party.

Kensington's psychic ability picked up on Rogue's inner turmoil, such was the curse of the Sanguinarian. Alas there was not much he could do to ease her torment, that was a battle she would have to fight alone.

As he listened to Lily her soft French accent brought back memories of his time in France during the Great War ((Check my Profile)). He had done many violent and brutal things during those four years, but he had done them in the knowledge that he was preserving the continuation of the Vampire coven's of Europe. He had met a beautiful French woman there, she was young and innocent. He had taken great pains to hide his true nature from her, they had spent many a time talking through the nights. He had loved her, but just as he was about to reveal his secret to her she had been killed in a German air raid. He cursed his delay in telling her, for he was sure she would have accepted him and even asked to be turned. Had she been turned, the air raid would not have harmed her and they could have spent eternity together.
Such wounds never fully healed, such was life. He had eventually moved on, there had been other women, but she was always there, just at the back of his mind, just out of reach in his dreams. Perhaps this was his curse?

He relived the memory of making his way to her small village only to see the smoke rising from the bombed buildings. He had rushed to her house only to find the broken, splintered remains. As he searched through the rubble he found her limp and broken body, such a delicate thing she was. He had laid her out in the street with the rest of the dead, awaiting the priest to administer his sermons. That was the last he saw of her, her pale lifeless face etched into his mind forever more.

He harboured a deep unseated contempt for man from that point on. They who created newer and more deadly forms of war; gone were the days of chivalry and honour, sold out to the person with the biggest bomb or the fastest rocket. Humans, little more than vermin; unaware of the beauty they could create, so careless with their precious lives. He had been one once, how different would his life have been had he not accepted the gift of immortality? Short for one thing.

Kensington realised he had been staring at his empty glass for some time, he looked up and tapped his glass gently on the bar.
'Same again old chap, but make it a double.'

Rogue's eyes lit up as she scanned Alexz's face. "My darling, it is so good to see your face." Rogue's eyebrow raised as she spoke. "We seem to be doing well enough, now that you've arrived. How has the endless cascade of time been treating you?"

Rogue inwardly tried to pull back her mind and close the doors as she wasn't quite excited to share with Alexz about losing her wits for the past few months in different cities across Europe. She had tried to connect with her siblings, Xandra, and Xander, the twins who were a more than capable pair of assassins...but it seemed, they too were struggling with some sort of pull on their bloodlust.

Maybe the answer lies in our bloodline...Oh God, I hope this is not the root of the problem....

Her mind had wandered and she hoped she had enough mental defenses to shield herself...even though she knew deep down, if Alexz merely looked, she would know. She always knew.
Rogue looked down at her glass and brought it to her lips taking another drink from the glass.

Dorian walked over and smiled at everyone. He held several menus under his arm, a half smile on his face. "How is everyone doing?" He placed the menus infront of everyone," Anything I can get you?"

Dorian smiled," I think I can do a bit of both. Give me a minute and I'll see what I can do." He walked over to the bar and disappeared under it, after a minute he popped back up with a small bottle in his hand. He brought it over and set it before Rogue."Here is your scotch." He smiled." and now the hope, it's on the house. I ain't got anything better, it's a classic. A 16 year old Lagavulin, also if you would like anything else. Feel free to let me know." He gestured to the others with her." Your friends too."