New York City, August 1992 AD.

It was a sizzling August afternoon when Julien arrived.  The six months past had gone so quickly despite Summer's efforts to make the world slow and lazy.  Blade hadn't noticed the time passing she was so busy with her modeling work, even appearing in music videos.  And Robert had been working with Steven at his office, falling all the more in love with his friend seeing this other side of him...the people he picked to work with him, all amazing.

They were sitting in their penthouse in Steven's building, Robert and Blade, Steven and John about as usual as if they were guardians against the daylight world. Louis was never around anymore. 

He'd spent a couple of months lying on the floor listening to music that frightened Blade, then drifted away from them to the point that even Psyche was not sure where he went when he disappeared.  There had been that brief period of time when Louis had felt useful among them, but he still felt that Blade had replaced him somehow.  Robert worried, Louis had been overly affectionate, needy, and for some reason he was not quite so close to Psyche as he had been.  It could only be guessed that Psyche had taken to staying longer periods of time among the Angels.  And so one day Louis had come to the house with his friend Julia and while she waited awkwardly he had announced he would not be coming around anymore.

All the better so far as Blade was concerned one less Vampyre to hide from her brother.  They'd informed Maury at the desk to let Julien in from then on and so when the ring came at the door John answered it knowing who it would be.  Julien smiled as he wobbled into the house, dropped large bags on the floor.  "Hi," he breathed.  And then he squinted behind dark glasses hardly able to see.  "It's cold in here," he said as he pushed the glasses up into his hair.

Blade managed to stand, layers of black and white fabric rearranging against her legs.  She beamed, beckoned.  Her brother walked across the room cautiously.  He seemed afraid to touch her but Blade snaked her arms up about his neck and Julien gave in.  He kissed her cheek as he drew away from her, glanced around to the others for a moment.

"You're so tall now," Blade said.

"Six-four," said Julien as if this were bad news.  And this was just as tall as Robert was.

"As tall as Dad."

"Hey, that's a Margiela!" Julien said.

Blade looked down at her layered outfit and large shoes. "Yeah, I bought it a while ago."

"It's gorgeous.  You even have the mules."  Julien shook his head, studied her.  "The whole re-construction thing: it's just—I'm speechless.  I own no designer clothes whatsoever, except the ones I made of course."

Blade gasped and raised a hand to her mouth.  But she looked very happy.  It seemed that suddenly she knew everything about him without need of supernatural power. "You're...a fashion student?"

"Yeah."

"That's great!  Are you good?"

"I got a scholarship."

"Really? Really?  I'm a model and you're...a fashion designer?  Why didn't you tell me before now?  Oh, Dad must be having puppies!"

"Cows," Julien laughed, "big ones," he gestured how wide.

Blade screamed.  Robert had seen her achieve this mood with John at a few parties. "I didn't introduce you or anything.  You met John a couple time right?"

Julien turned and made a wave. 

"This is Steven, you heard of him I bet.  He lives across the hall actually. And Robert."

Julien took both their hands briefly. 

Blade screamed again.  She gave Julien another hug.  "You have to make yourself at home.  The door near the stairs goes into your room, you got a bathroom, there the kitchen, other bathroom, our room, upstairs..." Blade pointed everything out very quickly.  In fact her voice got very fast when she said anything to Julien, but his speech was just as fast, and the louder they spoke the more blatantly obvious they grew up on Long Island and that Blade must have had a speech coach. 

Julien slouched on the sofa then. Robert presented him with the remote and he channel-hopped while looking over the top of his sunglasses.  The remote stopped on a cartoon: Darkwing Duck. "This is the funniest show I've ever seen—not funnier than Kids In The Hall—you ever watch cartoons?"

"Uh, no," Blade said.

Everyone, but John, who was in the kitchen, stared at the television. 

Julien started giggling and didn't seem to be able to stop.  The former dark and mysterious terror that flaps in the night—a duck in a purple and pink Phantom knock off—was now wearing white ruffles and skipping about showering the citizens of a city with a bay and a bridge with flower petals, at the behest of a duck in a bomber jacket, his adopted daughter— who might be have been a small red-haired goose in a hockey jersey—and the boy genius from next door—who would appear to have for parents one chicken and one goose.

"Is it really all that funny?" Blade asked.

Then Robert started laughing. 

Steven leaned close to him and then he started laughing as well. 

"Honey, Disney could not have made this show," Robert said.

Steven wiped a tear from one eye. 

"You should see DW's girlfriend, she's a witch."

Robert looked at Julien, laughing, "A witch?"

"She's a regular fag hag," Julien said.

Blade lay her head in a hand, "Oh, Jou Jou..." she groaned. 

He managed to tear himself away from the TV to look at her.  "Huh?"

"Six years?" Her voice lowered, "did they keep you locked in that house for six years?"

Julien didn't say anything.

b                  b                  b

At the office Robert sat with his feet up on Steven's desk as Steven refereed to the monitor in front of him.  He looked up at the ceiling tiles, bored.  "Is it hard what you do?" He asked.

"No. I don't think so. I haven't pushed myself into any stressful situations recently."

"Oh."

"It's difficult to keep so many people honest.  It would be easier if I could read minds."

"Thought you didn't want to be a vampire, Steven?"

"You never asked."

Robert looked down from the tiles.  "Do you?"

"No."  That figured.

"But why not?"

"Because, you have to kill.  The mind reading part is interesting but..."

Robert sat straight up, "Steven, any man can kill, it's rare they can get inside your head. I thought that after what happened to you that you would realize that is the real horror: not the gore and blood, the psychological impact, the mindfucks, the omniscience."

"Would it be frightening if I was the one with the power?"

"Yes!"  Robert said, "Steven, such sad and horrible thing just float into your head, you know everything, or close to it, all the weight of knowing what things are like.  Haven't you seen all those old horror movies or the Twilight Zone episodes in which men who know some truth are locked up screaming because no one wants to believe them?"

Steven looked up, slyly, or maybe suspiciously.  "I don't need to see them, I lived it."

"Oh, yes, that.  You realize of course I needed to tell you, I needed you badly."

Steven glanced up for just another second then lowered his eyes to his desk.  "I know.   I'm sure you needed someone to believe you.  I was not too happy with your sister, however.  I almost lost it...that's why I...well, sometimes I do get scared, I don't want you around, but then I think: no one else is going to believe these things.  Who's going to believe I met Death?"  It seemed Steven's hands were shaking.

"Want me to fix you a drink?"  Robert asked as the door opened behind him.

Steven looked up as Robert sensed it was Monday.  The young man was Steven's resident computer consultant.  "No..."

Monday walked inside office then, hair brushed over an ear and glasses on. The usual jeans and concert T-shirt. Robert glanced over his shoulder, then looked back.  There was a burn on Monday's face, old and scarred over; it was usually hidden by hair.  "Oh, hi," he said, "I was just checking things out...it's late."

"We were just, hanging out," Robert said.

A smile came and went from Monday's face.

"We just met Blade's brother," Steven said, "he's about the same age as you."

"Oh.  Does he know?"  Of course Monday knew.  Monday, Robert had learned previously, was the very one who had helped Blade track down the family.  He was something of a hacker, who used his powers to aid the forces of goodness. 

"No," Robert said, "and Blade doesn't want him to."

Monday removed his glasses and rubbed his eyes.  He was smiling just slightly.  He'd do things if he believed Blade wanted them, but then most boys his age would do anything if a gorgeous supermodel visited their house and asked nicely.  "Well, I'll go," he said.  He left the office slowly.

Steven watched the door intently.  "Robert," he said softly, "fix me a drink will you?"

Robert tilted his head cutely and watched Steven.  "You can't drink in front of Monday?" 

Steven seemed upset.  "You don't just know?"

"I don't use those powers unless I need to," Robert said.  But even as he said it he was reaching for Monday's mind.  "I don't want to know the thoughts and history of everyone I meet."  But he knew then.  Saw the loud man drop the bottle and shove little Monday into the stove.  He saw the saucepan slide across the range, the child's cheek make contact with the burner.

Steven was at his bar, pouring scotch into a wide glass. 

"His father did that to him?"

Steven nodded.  "He didn't mean to."

"You're not alcoholic, are you Steven?"

Steven set the glass down with a small thud.  "Damn, Robert, you're going to drive me not to drink."  

b                  b                  b

Blade was lying across her bed, the same metal canopy bed she'd moved from her old apartment.  She was nude, the room completely dark, electronic dance music came across the house and quietly into her room.  She glanced up as Robert came into the room.  He closed the door behind him.  "It's a lot like life, we play between the sheets, with you on top and me underneath?" He sang in question.

"Depeche Mode," she explained. 

Robert sat on the bed and lay one hand at the small of her back.  "You OK?"

"Uh huh, I think so."

Robert bowed to kiss her neck; Blade turned away almost violently.

"Well, do y' want to go out then?"

"I don't feel like it, I'm tired."

"Go out," Robert said, playful whine.

Blade lay her face on the comforter.  "Does Jules seem naive to you?"

"Not really...I don't know what you mean."

"The way he talks, it's like he knows a lot about some things, but other's he's just stupid about.  I don't know, I just want him to be OK."

"I'm sure he'll be fine," Robert said.

"He's got no family...Dad's not going to speak to him now either.  Ah, I should just go kill my father!" 

"Baby, he's got you."

"I'm not fucking Human!"

Robert shook his head, lifted Blade from the bed by her waist.  "C'mon, let's get out of here."

"Let me sleep..." she cried.

"You've been pushing yourself.  Let's go look for someone...we can visit Louis afterward, he never said we couldn't go see him, and I know you and he actually do like each other.  You don't want to hurt Julien."

"I would never hurt Julien!"

"You're young yet.  You could do it."

Blade hit Robert in the jaw.

He sat back and glared at her.  "Get dressed," he commanded as he rubbed his jaw.

Blade pulled on dirty clothes from the floor, someone's pair of jeans and a black

T-shirt.  She pulled on her all-stars in a huff.  "Satisfied?"

"You look good in anything."

She sneered.  "Why don't you go visit Louis by yourself?"

Robert shook his head. "You are tired...hungry."

"Don't treat me like I'm a monster!"

"You are one of the Nephillim Spawn, Baby."

She hit him in the chest with both fists.  Robert winced, raised his arm.  "Don't you dare hit me!" She said, a bit too loudly.

"You hit me."

Blade hopped off the bed and stomped to the door.  She went out into the large open room.  Robert followed.  Blade was picking up a jacket and purse.  Julien was standing at the kitchen counter with an apple and a long kitchen knife.  He looked up at Robert quite casually. 

Blade stomped across the room. 

Julien called to her. 

She turned.

"Going out?"  The knife sliced the apple's skin. 

Blade stared at the knife.  Her eyes darted to Robert then. "I'm OK," she said, brushed her hair back behind her ears.  "Robert's coming with me."

Robert moved to the door slowly. 

Julien waved the knife at them, as if they were supposed to think him playful, "Now don't you kids stay out all night."  How could Blade possibly be afraid for that boy?

As soon as they were alone in the hall she hit Robert in the shoulder.  "You made me almost lose it in front of him!"  Tears were falling fast. 

Robert held an arm about Blade's shoulders as they walked.  He got her outside the building without incident. 

But once she realized they were heading to the Necropolis she bolted.

b                  b                  b

Faye was home alone when Robert arrived, a little unusual, it probably meant Min had a new girlfriend. She was lying stretched on the couch watching videos on BET.  She looked up briefly as Robert came from the tunnels.  But when he said her name the tone of his voice caused her to look hard at him and sit up.  "What?"

Robert fell to the floor in front of the couch.  "It's Blade, she just ran off."

"What did she say?" Faye asked, her voice betraying the fact that she was sick of Blade being the cause of trouble for the rest of the family.  Robert was starting to get pretty sick of it himself. 

Robert shook his head.  "She was talking about not being Human anymore."

Faye stood, lifting Robert with her as she did.  She didn't look him in the face.  "We have to find her.  Now."

She was already moving toward the tunnels. 

"Faye!"

"I don't know for sure, of course, but this could be something bad."

Robert jogged after her.  They were walking through the tunnels very quickly. 

"Can you locate her?"

"I feel her moving away from me."

"Direction?"  Already they were coming up from underground. 

"East, maybe."  Robert grabbed at Faye's arm.

She turned, stared at his hand till he removed it.  "In China, I went through something," she said slowly.  "If it's come upon Blade we must keep her from hurting anyone she shouldn't.  It's dangerous enough for us in New York."

Robert tried to pinpoint the single soul that was Blade's.  He could feel her, feel her fragility and madness.  "This way, I'm pretty sure."

"Chase her," Faye said, "Let her know you're after her, I'll try to cut her off."

She was gone before Robert could answer.  He took off running, sailing across streets and over debris of the city.  Blade knew he was chasing, she began zig-zagging. 

Robert called on Louis.

Why Blade might try running toward water Robert had no idea, but she seemed to be, unless she would cross the river to Queens.  He felt himself gaining, felt her awareness and alarm quite clearly.  Could she mean to run all the way out to Nassau County, to her parents?

And then he felt himself gain even faster.  Blade had stopped.  Faye was calling: hurry.  They were fighting each other and Blade was stronger than Faye was.

Faye was slumped against a wall a smear of blood above her head where it had hit.  "Go.  Get her...the others are coming for me," Faye said.

Robert ran on after Blade. 

She moved up, climbing a building when she knew she'd run out of roads. 

Robert found her quite quickly then, leapt right to the ledge on which she stood. "You tricked me!" She screamed at him, "You took this body, which reminds you of the only thing ever denied you, Shade!  You should have let me live!" 

"What?" Had she forgotten she was the one who had given him only two choices: kill her or give her the blood.  But she would jump, he knew that. 

"You might survive the fall," Robert said.  He jumped; Blade jumped an instant later.  Robert, having a second's start on her caught a lower ledge and braced himself, caught Blade then, by the arm, as she fells down past him. 

She struggled wildly, in vain.  "You should have killed me when I asked you to!  You should have just let me live my life..."

Robert kicked in the nearest window and swung Blade's weight out and then her whole body onto the floor of the room inside.  He dropped down inside after her, pinning her to the carpet and broken glass. 

"Don't do this," Blade hissed.

"Don't you want to die now?"

She just shook and sobbed as Robert nailed her neck to the floor with his fangs and took her blood.

The sound of glass shards crushing against each other.  Louis was standing just inside the window looking down at his feet.  "Well, this is the second time you've had to call to me on her account, Father," he said.

Robert climbed off Blade, turned his back to her. 

"We better take her underground," Louis said.

b                  b                  b

Louis was the one to put Blade in the vault and lock the door.  Robert mainly sat on his bed staring at this door.  "There's no choice about this really," Louis said. 

He was explaining that, when in China, Faye had fallen in love with a young and beautiful prince of something.  He had not understood what she was, and when he spoke of things like marriage and children Faye had been crushed.  She had only then realized that loss. 

"It's worse for the women that way," he said.  "Of course the Mother and the Old Fathers, those are the ancient ones who live in China, they had seen this come over many of our kind.  They are different over there.  They do not turn the young very often, Humans must prove themselves by performing certain tasks, must have already lived and experienced life before they may receive the blood."

Louis said they had been enthralled, and also often disgusted by him, because his body was so young. 

"You knew her only a day perhaps when you turned her," he said.  "It was lust, admit that much to me, Pa, it was lust."

Robert shook his head.  "It wasn't, you know. Oh, when I was with her...if only Julien hadn't come...she seemed almost right after that mess with Lucifer."

"I'm sure there were a number of times she seemed right, the problem is it never lasts.  You made a Vampyre of someone who seeks to be good and yet is quite rebellious, she's very much like Lucifer you know, at least the way other's describe him as being before he really fell.  She's never going to be entirely all right.  And she's yours."

Blade was clawing softly at the door and Robert could hear the sound quite clearly.  It was maddening him.

"Don't even think to go in there to her," Louis said. 

"She's in pain.  It's not right."

"You sound like her.  Jesus!  It's not right..." 

Robert let his body fall back to the bed and lay there with his knees drawn up.  "I should have let her live."

Louis huffed.  "You shouldn't have turned her for sure, but I think you should have let me go kill her.  I wouldn't have fallen in love."

"Maybe not with her, maybe not the way I did, but you can't blame me when you do fall in love in your turn.  What about Francesca, or Isabelle?  You never killed either of those girls...or even Julia, your new friend.  You won't kill her, I can tell."

"I don't remember all their names..." Louis said softly, but it was probably a lie.

"You know they were both pretty girls, artist's models."

"Oh, them, yes, I did rather think Isabelle reminded me of Francesca.  But it wasn't just like you say: I might have killed them, but someone else always managed to steal them away.  Julia's different, more like the boys...you know."

Robert laughed weakly.  "I know all about your boys," he said, "now that I think of it, if I were you I would have been really upset when Jon died before I could kill him: you killed every one of your boys."

"And I loved them, in a way.  You see, we should have killed Blade, you should have seen that she would reach for a gun, and killed her right there, saved John so we could drive him mad.  He's much more interesting.  We didn't need another addition to the family, if anyone it should have been Steven."

"No!  Steven could never live with the killing.  And I did need another.  It's been so long, and you and me, we can't always stand to be together."

Louis sighed, "Well, you have her now, as your lover.  We'll see what happens.  Perhaps there will be others for all of us, but we should be more careful."

"Easy to say when you are not the one in love."

One day Robert waited: till the sun next set, and then he could stand to listen to Blade's whines no longer. 

She did nothing but sit on the floor once the door was opened.  And when Louis came and put a bowl of blood before her she put her face in it and slurped up blood.  Louis laughed when Blade looked up, her face slick and bright red with blood.  "The supermodel," he said. 

"It's not enough," she said.

"Play my game and I'll get you more: tell me, are you good?"

"I don't know.  Don't do this to me."

"I'm only doing it because I care."

"I've heard that one, it's bullshit, Louis, now give me the blood or I'll take yours."

"As if."

"Don't be cute," Blade growled.

"Play with me, c'mon."

She nodded very slowly.  "It has become obvious that the major difference between the blind and the seeing is that the blind think that God and goodness are the same thing, while the seeing can pull back the curtain and see the evil little man there.  There is goodness in the world, but it has nothing to do with what God really is.  God, and Love beside it, are the most horrible inventions.  That is why we are in awe of them, down in the very core of self we recognize the horror of Everything.  I mean to go on serving those causes because horrible as they are they are real, and everything else in comparison is petty.  Anything else is really Nothing.  Call me good if you want, say I'm sick for wanting to be good and yet kill.  It's my nature to kill, and nature comes from God.  I will defeat petty terrors because they are vile and distracting and I dislike them." 

Robert shook his head.  "What?"  He threw up his arms.  "What?  That makes no sense at all...an evil little man, the Wizard?  And yet you will serve that?  You will serve what the world calls good and yet is evil?  Serve a lie?"

"Do not try to explain to me about the gods who engineered Humans and our need to dominate, to rebel in order to feel real.  Don't tell me that it's a good idea to fight nature, if we took things you said about evolution literally we'd all refuse to procreate on principle, we'd just die out.  All your best Angelic friends are content to serve the most sublime horror so why not let me do the same?"

"I do not think that when you say horror you mean horror, I think you must mean truth.  Serving truth is noble, serving truth removes you from the dichotomy of things, as long as you serve any and all truths.  And truth may have something to do with Everything, but it is not well served by religion.  I do not think you really know what God is, no one does very well.   And yet I don't think you are meaning to serve truth."

"Truth is horror.  Truth destroyed my life!"

Robert shrugged.  But frustrated still he pulled at his hair.  "Whose truth are we talking about?"

Blade smiled.  She did not answer Robert she only smiled wickedly at Louis.  "See, Louis, I have come through the fire, I've shed my mortal skin.  I think I'll survive very well know that I understand, now that I am armed."

"You can't stay here," Louis said flatly.  He did not seem to care whether or not she was mad, only that she seemed under control.

Blade raised herself up on her feet.  "I know.  Robert will take me away to Europe, we'll stay a few years, and we'll come back well before Julien graduates.  He needs to know he has a sister somewhere in the world."

"You'll just let him be?" Louis asked.

"Of course, it's rather what you boys should have done to me, but then, you are nearly petty horrors, I would have to kill you if you did not have the interesting habit of sneaking into people's bedrooms and rearranging their minds...shattering their illusions."

She kissed him, Louis, and when she held him in awe she took the blood from him. 

b                  b                  b

Blade went to Steven first and told him what had really happened. And then she went to John, and told him she was going to move to Paris, and that he should not worry, and that he had always been her best friend. Of course then she had to do something to pacify Julien.

She and Robert went home together. Julien was in his room hanging posters.  She sat down on the bed, faked a few sobs and told him she was moving to Paris.  Julien said that he envied her.  Blade explained to Julien that his image of Paris was probably far more wonderful than the real Paris and that she thought there were novels in which this was a theme: the disappointment that came when illusions were shattered by the truth.  Books she had been made to read in school and not understood as a child.  She said to him in a rather whiny voice that she had been to a doctor just the week before he came and that tests had come back recently: she would never have children, and being he was a man he just wouldn't understand how terrible this was. 

Julien tried to look sorry, but as Blade had predicted the whole topic rather disinterested him.  She sobbed some more, made a point of rubbing at her eyes.  "I just need to get away," she said, "don't tell anyone, I'd be embarrassed if they found out, I want you to stay here, you can have any money you need, we have lots."

Julien asked if she thought the Madonna poster looked straight.

Blade said, "I don't even think these walls are straight..."

Steven came to the house while they were packing and good-byes were said.  Steven promised to look after Julien.  And after some persuasion Julien promised to let Steven look after him.