"The Group"

by Ladydeathbird age 32. ^_^

He slowly walked into the room eying his new partners suspiciously. The Vatican in their infinite wisdom had assigned him to this group after he had officially been ordained. The room was muggy and smelt of cigars, sweat, cheap booze, and was that…incense?

“Ah! Padre! Glad you could make it. We were beginning to think the church was going to make us wait a few more months out of spite, what with the last father biting it the way he did.”

The oratory came from a leather clad man who once having been seated at a rather rickety table was now upright and walking towards the priest.

“Yeah, Holy Mother Church had to wait for me to complete seminary and take my vows.” The father said this as he slowly extended his hand to shake the hand presented him.

“Well might as well get you acquainted with the folks who will save your ass as soon as kill it. Still seated you have Guns, Wires, and Pyro. On the bed, you have The Countess. Oh and over by the wall, “he leaned in close giving the priest a strong whiff of musty cologne and cigar smoke, “Be careful of her, she hates the church” straightened himself and resumed his previous tone, “you have Allegory.”

The priest nodded with each introduction save the last. He slowly walked up to the table still housing the three with whom he was introduced and set his seeming medicine bag upon it.

“Mr. James Monroe a.k.a. Guns, Mr. Alexander Rominov a.k.a. Wires, and Mathew Onekama, a.k.a. Pyro. How do you do, my name is…”

“Father Michael Fitzroy. Quite an interesting name and history you have there Father.” This came from a sultry voice by the bed. A languid form stood up and began walking towards the group at the table.

 “And of course you know me father. The Lady Serena Cordilrey a.k.a. The Countess. But unlike my contemporaries here, my name is my title. And of course you have had the pleasure of Thomas Elgrave a.k.a. Oni,” she extended an elegant hand to the man Father Fitzroy had met first.

“And of course last but not least, her celestial highness, the Lady Amarna a.k.a. Allegory. But considering who you are merciful Father Fitzroy, I do not expect belief, but to preserve your longevity, I must ask you to treat her as you would treat a representative of another religious sect,” she said giving a part bow/part head nod to the figure in the corner of the room who returned it in kind.

“Now merciful Father, please come sit with me and do tell me all of the latest happenings in Rome. It has been an eternity since I have heard anything worthwhile with respect to goings on within the walls of the holiest of sanctuaries.” She lightly motioned for Pyro to get up so Father Fitzroy could have a seat while she took the one formerly occupied by Oni.

“But Madam Cordilrey, I am not sure I understand why you would be concerned after you were discovered to be the lover of his holy eminence Pope Marinus the first and later found to be a succubus.” Father Fitzroy said confused by her interest considering her history, longevity, and the team’s access to the technology as supplied by both the treasuries of the church and Lady Cordilrey’s estate.

“Kid, it isn’t so much that she cares about current events as much as what you are packin in both mind and body,” Guns said as he laid a wild card onto the pile of uno cards splayed in the middle of the table, “Red.”

Father Fitzroy’s jaw dropped but then took note of the supple hand on his thigh. He quickly stood up, “Ah. Well that being said. I am happy to meet with all of you and look forward to our first mission together. If you will excuse me I would like to take a moment to use the facilities and get a glass of water.” He scanned the room resting his eyes on Allegory. She was leaning against the wall with her head bowed, eyes closed, and had her arms and legs crossed. As if sensing his attention she raised her right hand and pointed to the bathroom door located in the southeast corner of the room. She made no other acknowledgements to him and he half wondered how she knew he had been looking at her.

He quickly bowed his head in acknowledgement and rather hastily walked over to the bathroom. He partly did need to take care of business there and he partly needed to extract himself from the attentions of the rather voluptuous Madam Cordilrey. He did not look back to the table but could feel her eyes on him as he walked away from the group. Father Monahan was right, she was brash, bold, and had the body to make a man question his faith.

How she had managed to survive as long as she had was still something his ever inquisitive mind wanted to research regardless of the dangers involved. He would have to take his time in finding out the answer though and take care in doing so lest she try to demand payment for the information in a way he was not willing to pay.

***********

The door clicked closed.

“He’s a virgin you know.” The Countess beamed to the group as if she had acquired a new toy as she got up to give Pyro back his chair.

“He is a man of the cloth and we cannot take anymore chances with the church right now. So holster your lust or take a night out and go play with the locals.” Oni sat back down in his chair taking up his hand of uno cards and chewing on the end of his cigar in irritation.

She sniffed at his comment and walked to the door. “Fine I will see you lot later. I am going to see what is to be had in the bar downstairs. Maybe Santa will be nice to me early.” She took off her coat, exposing a tight, short black dress that lead nothing to the imagination about her body. The boys paid no attention to her, knowing her powers, and continued to stare at their cards and suspiciously at each other making sure no one was cheating again. She gave a slight irritated look at their lack of attention, tossed her hair back and stormed out of the room.

“No envy for the jackass getting fucked by that tonight.” Wires shivered.

“Bout this kid.” Guns bobbed his head towards the bathroom. “That kid is going to get killed the minute one of those bastards catches his scent. Yo, your move.” Guns sniffed and bobbed his head at Wires.

“Hm? I’m thinkin. I’m thinkin. Yeah well he is quite the brain child though. Before joinin the cloth, collar boy there was quite a savant. He’s got a doctorate in History and Chemistry is a master of four human languages, not to mention he can speak, read, and write most of the ugly bugger’s language.” Wires said as he threw down a green draw two.

“Fucker. I’ll get you for that. Yeah but does he have the strength, the balls, and the ability to fight those monsters let alone keep ol Lusty there away from himself.” Pyro said as he picked up two cards.

“Heh. And that was just a draw two you little prick, wait till you try to play a draw four on his ass. Good point. But the church seems to know their stuff. They told me they took special care to train this one differently in the seminary. Sorry Wires it is the only one of this color I got.” Oni laid down a green reverse.

“Oh it is on you little techie fucker!” Pyro rattled the table as his threw down a draw four wild card. “Blue!”

“Oni! Godammit Matt you are going to break the freakin table! Gawd it is just a damn game, stop being so damned vindictive.” Wires whined as he held on to the sides of the table to keep it from tipping over and then grabbed four cards as Guns threw down a blue skip.

“Sorry man it’s the only blue card I got.”

“Fucker. Hurry up Matt, I want to head to the bar downstairs soon to see if the Packer’s are playin tonight.”

“The Packers? Are you still pining for that damn team? You know they lost the season, its only a matter of time for Miami this year.” Pyro laid down a blue draw two.

“Dick. It’s football season again? Want me to get the stats to see about making a lil extra cash this year?” Wires picked up two more cards.

“Yo. You are all fools. It’s LA all the way man.” Guns picked up and laid down a blue eight on the discard deck.

“Still in denial about your team, man. Uno.” Oni laid down a blue six.

“What? Fuck! Already? Man Wires you better have a fucking reverse in your deck.” Pyro laid down a yellow six.

“Oh now you want to be buddies after fucking me over the last two turns? Fine here.” Wires put down a yellow reverse.

“Ohhh yeah! Oni just face it your team sucks and by the way draw four.” Pyro flipped a draw four onto the table.

“Fuck! Did I not just tell you I wanted to go see the game?” Oni grabbed four cards.

“Suck it up hair boy. Uno.” Guns throws down a yellow draw two.

“DAMMIT! What the fuck did I do today to get this kind of treatment?” Wires picked up two cards.

“You were born you damn cyber fucker.” Pyro laid down a yellow two.

“Alright!” Oni laid down a yellow zero.

“Out.” Guns laid down a yellow nine as each of the others jaws drop.

“What?” Guns got up, stretched, and nodded his head at Oni. “Come on man games on.”

“Wha? Oh right!” Oni dumped his cards on the discard stack, stumped his cigar in the ashtray to his right on the table, grabbed his old leather jacket, and hopped up to head to the bar downstairs with Guns.

Pyro threw his cards on the deck and stood up to follow them to the bar. “

“Mathew, wait.” He almost jumped and looped back to see Amarna coming towards him.

“Yeah babe what is it?”

“Three things. One, don’t call me babe. Two lighten up the language; I am getting tired of the profanity.  And three where are the other beds? There is one bed in this room and I am damned if I am sleeping on the floor.”

“Urp gotcha. The other rooms are right across the hall. But hey the night is still young, 'Marna. Let’s jam downstairs, get a few drinks, and something to eat.” Pyro smiled and looked for any sort of reaction to gauged whether or not he should try another tactic. Amarna wasn’t the type of deity one screwed with and it was hard to tell whether or not she would be up for his games tonight.

“Don’t push your luck Mathew. Move your ass and I will decide whether or not I join you.”

She turned to look at the bathroom door and then to Wires. “You going to wait for collar boy to finish up or you want us to stick it out with you till then?”

Wires was gathering up the deck of well used Uno cards, chewing his lip about how he would whip ass next game when he heard her. “Hmm. Oh. OH! Him, almost forgot about him. Hey Padre move your ass we are going downstairs to eat, drink and be merry before we kick major baddie ass.”

The door slowly opened up and a Father Fitzroy quickly scanned the room before completely emerging.

“Yeah she is gone. She’s downstairs to scope out the lunchmeat. Hey she may even take out a baddie or two and save us some trouble. She’s one of our resident deity’s finer manifestations.” Wires set the cards in his bag and slung it over his shoulder, “But don’t worry Padre she knows the rules about team members and especially the ones of the cloth. She won’t touch you, just mess with you from time to time.” He walked through the now open door and lightly jogged down the hall towards the bar downstairs.

“One of your manifestations? Just how many manifestations do you have?” Father Fitzroy said as he adjusted his glasses and hesitantly began following Wires.

“Succubae, vampires, things that go bump in the night to frighten small monkeys. The vampires are the current toys I have been ordered to put away. They had their uses three thousand years ago but lately they haven’t been doing a lot of good for my P.R.”

Amarna casually took Pyro’s extended arm and they followed the father out of the room. Pyro took the liberty to lock the door although outside of a few clothes there was nothing of value they would willingly leave in a hotel of this caliber.

“You see in order to get back into the graces of my family and do the things that I really want to do, I must make slight accommodations to appease the ruling religious sects. But trust me when I say that despite your beliefs, you are but a pebble in the waters of human faith. Hmm. You smell nice tonight Mathew, glad you chose to grace us with soap and water.”

“Yeah well, I was starting to get to me, but you know we had to wait until we got to a hotel.”

“Yes but I could have created a nice downpour to facilitate your hygiene.”

“You know what Oni said about influencing local crap. No hi-jinks the yokels may treat as a blessing or omen.”

“Well aware. Well aware. How about you Father Fitzroy, ever see the miracles of a deity before?” Amarna said casually as she lightly stepped down the stairs leading to a rather seedy looking bar full of various people from what looked like all over the country.

“Miracles do not necessarily need to be seen to be felt Miss Allegory.” Father Fitzroy knew from a prior briefing that when in public codenames were required.

“Yes but sometimes Pyro here requires a miracle of the viewing and feeling nature more often so that his appearance doth not offend our eyes and noses.” Allegory chuckled as they met up with the rest of their troupe.

“Ah. The merciful father has decided to grace us with his presence after all. Refreshed after your long travels and ready to sup with us?” The Countess said eloquently despite her rather awkward position of using two men’s laps for a sofa. They did not seem to mind their current use as one was rubbing his left hand up and down her legs and the other had his left hand on her behind.

He tried to ignore the rather lewd comments the three were making about the evening they had planned on sharing and diverted his attentions to the remaining members of the group.

Oni and Guns were almost competing to see who could imbibe more alcohol than the other without passing out while screaming at the 19 inch television that almost seemed to be levitating in the dim smoke filled room. Wires was sporting a wide grin at the veritable carnage of the football game on TV while working towards the bottom of a large plate of ribs. Guns and Oni would take the liberty of grabbing a few off his plate occasionally winning irritated looks from Wires.

Pyro and Amarna had already seated themselves at the large table the rest of the group occupied in the middle of the room and were in the middle of ordering their food and drink. Wires quickly added another two large plates of ribs to the order so that Oni and Guns would leave his “the hell alone” as he bluntly put. 

The Father took a seat by Wires just as a rather irritated waitress came to his side for his order. “Oh, ah what are your specials miss?”

“Well we have all you can eat ribs, soup, burgers, sandwiches. Here’s a menu Pops.” She said bluntly and stuffed an oily laminated menu in front of him.

“Oh ok. How about a long neck and a basket of fries?”

The rest of the group stopped and looked at the father stunned.

“What? No fries? Uh how about chicken strips then? Yes that sounds better thank you.”

“A long neck?” Wires said between mouthfuls.

“Ohhh. The merciful father is not opposed to the ingesting of spirits? Hmm makes me wonder what else he isn’t opposed to. Oh! You naughty sofa. Wait till I get you upstairs…” The Countess chuckled as she got up, and motioned for her furniture to follow her flipping her hair as she turned and sauntered up the stairs. Both men quickly set their beers on the table and hurried after her with half the room of guys eying and wanting to follow.

“Poor bastards. Eh but one’s a hit man and the other is wanted for various degrees of assault and murder. No one will miss them and they’ll be dust in the a.m.” Wires said not even bothering to look in the direction of lust what with a full plate of ribs just arriving at the table.

The father made a silent prayer for them regardless of what type of people they were, subtly made the symbol for the cross in the air and whispered “amen” as a long neck beer was firmly set onto the table along with a basket of chicken strips. He managed a quick thank you as she stormed off to serve the other patrons.

Pyro and Allegory were already eating, drinking, and casually watching the display of Oni and Guns almost coming to blows over what Oni insisting was a bad call on the part of the referee. Wires was already on his third plate of ribs. Where the boy managed to store all that food was a wonder. “He must have a thyroid condition or something.” The Priest thought as took a swig on his beer and took a bite of chicken.

***********

A half hour later the Countess sauntered down and thudded down in a free chair at the table. “Hmmm I’m full. But I hate it when my meals are all talk, but when you get down to the matter, only a whisper of action. However, the nights still young and I may get lucky yet with this seedy lot.”

Wires was starting to show signs of slowing as a fifth plate of ribs arrived but with a look of determination began to clean the plate.

It was then that three pale men came into the bar and sat down at a table in the corner. The waitress gave a wary glance in their direction, went to them, quickly went back to the bar, and returned to their table with three empty glasses and a bottle of what looked like red wine.

“Ohhh look, dessert! Please, allow me everyone as you are all in the midst of supping while I have only started.” The Countess said quietly as she languidly stood up and walked over to the now occupied corner.

“The one on the left of the small pack is new. But the nice thing about her highness over there is that Allegory made her virtually irresistible to them. Most of them. Too bad we couldn't use her talents for good as well as bad.”

Allegory twitched her left eyebrow in irritation. “Wires.” She spoke slowly. “Sex appeal is not the cure for CANCER!”

“We still…”
 

“Still my ass Wires. I told you before that she wasn’t made for that. Now drop it!”

“Oh she is just pissy because Pyro is still healing so they can’t…”

“Hey now! How the hell did I get pulled into this?”

“Wires, we do not need to hear about your theory on how, “If they can find all sorts of other cures from plants and animals. Why can’t we see if the Countess can cure cancer?” Crap. She was one of my toys and I am telling you we didn’t even know about cancer 2500 years ago so how the hell would we make a cure for it?” Allegory shot him a glance of irritation.

“But if we had a guinea pig of some sort.”

Oni interjected, “Ok Wires you get cancer and we will have the Countess screw you. If you live you’re cured.”

“Urp. Never mind.”

***********