Vivienne

“Franco…”  Livia shivered once more and her flowery irises closed, “...He’s only tried to find..”  She gulped and stepped back, and nearly tripped on her feet. “Blue eyes…it…you…”

Vivienne uncrossed her arms and knelt over to kiss Faye’s neck. “Thank you, mon amour.  You played the part well.  Perhaps you should be on stage.”  Vivienne watched as Livia’s hands started to shake, “Doctor Vivienne Moreau.” Offering her hand, Vivienne wrapped her arm around Faye, “It is a pleasure to meet you, Miss Vegas.”

“I…acc…um…”  The prostitute vampire barely managed to shake Vivienne’s hand.

“Quite the enterprise you have here, Miss Vegas.  How many are in the Velvet Underground?”  Vivienne politely asked.

Casey cleared her throat, “Viv.  We have company.”

Turning to face the small group, Vivienne smiled. “Thank you my ward.”  

“Be nice, please.”  Faye echoed and counted the gathering crowd. “I don’t get the feeling that they are going to attack us in front of everyone.  Just curious?”

Taking a couple seconds to assess the situation, Vivienne plotted out in her head the exact way she’d turn the crowd into fragments of dust should the situation become dire.  Deciding to keep the light hearted moment going, Vivienne reassured Faye, “Pleasant company, Faye.  Mon amour, Thank you for your reminder to be nice.”  She turned Faye to her and planted a gentle kiss on her lover's pink lips. “What would I do without your generous wisdom, mon amour?”  Vivienne chuckled lightly and peered at Livia with her oceanic blue eyes, “Could you kindly answer the question, Miss Vegas?”

Livia jumped with the inflection of the word “could” from Vivienne and then laughed, “I..I..yes.”  Her fear slowly faded and she swaggered a few steps forward, making her ample breasts bounce in her tight bodice. “F..five, with double that in thralls.”  She pointed to the crowd around them. “They…they..um..”  She sighed and shook her head, “...they would be useless, right?”

Knowing that she really didn’t have to answer, Vivienne smiled. “A fair sized group.”  She paused and glanced at the others still gawking at her, “What did you do before you came to Phantasmagoria?”

“Roamed, mostly.”  Livia’s flowery eyes budded once more as her fear subsided. “I have only ever heard rumors of your eyes, R..Raven…um Vivienne.”

Casey waved at the others as they one by one disappeared into the crowd. “Viv, I think our cover is blown now.”  She pointed to one of the thralls sprinting up stairs and whispering to others as he did so. “What do we do now?”

Faye bounced in place, “We check out the rest of the place, are you kidding me?  This is fantastic.”  She turned to face Vivienne, “We are here to check this all out before your clandestine meeting, right?”  Faye giggled.

Livia turned and pointed to the other side of the building, “My show is going to start in a few minutes.  You are welcome to stay if you’d like and … um… watch, or just over there are our technical advisors.”

Casey scanned Livia and in her tight leather, “What show are you doing in that?”

Raising one of her long white eyebrows, Livia swaggered to Casey and stood close enough to almost touch their breasts together. “A live action version of the movie Heathers.”  Reaching in a tight pocket, Livia pulled out a bright red sucker to match her lollipop lips, licked it once and then handed it to Casey. “I could always use another…Heather.”

A dangerous feeling rippled through the young ward and she embraced it. “Perhaps later.  I am duty bound, Miss Vegas.”  She tossed the sucker in her mouth, “Mmm, how did I know this would be cherry?”

Livia winked and walked back toward her stage, “Shame, really.  You have potential.”  Livia pointed once more to the other side of the lobby, “DEDSEC, is the name of the designers of the building and all of the nerdy things.”  Livia licked her lips once more, “Cherry…cheery, same thing, right?”  She disappeared behind a curtain and left the three alone.

Faye grabbed Vivienne’s hand and started tugging. “I see the shop from here. Come…onnnnn..”

Laughing lightly at her lover’s impatient excitement, Vivienne reached out for Casey’s hand. “You seem to attract all sorts, my ward.”

“I am used to guys hitting on me.  I am not used to it from women.”  She laughed at Faye, “Aren’t you older than me?”

A few minutes later, Vivienne and company stood outside the door of an almost hidden little business. “It would appear that this Kody is much less flashy than the rest of the bazaar.”  Vivienne pointed to the sign, “Phantasmagoria Plasma works, a DEDSEC subsidiary.”

Frowning and curling her eyebrows down, Faye peeked inside the doorway and noted that it was a small office space with six chairs and two people working the entire place.  “Blood donations?”  Faye wondered and scratched her head, “Vivi-bean we must have the wrong place.”  Shaking her hand free of Vivienne's, Faye stepped into the reception area and up to the desk, where she saw a younger looking person with messy brown hair looking at a green circuit board. “Excuse me?  I am looking for..”

Kody looked up with their power button looking eyes, “Wait.”  Their eyes flashed white for a second before speaking again, “Faye Moreau, green eyes, black-pink hair.  Accompanied by Vivienne Moreau, alias,  The Raven.  Legendary blue eyes.”  Kody set the tool he was using to the side, “I can safely assume you are not here to give blood.”

Shaking her head gently, the half-Korean woman looked confused. “I thought I would find a like minded group here.”  She tapped on her chest lightly, “I recently rediscovered that I used to go by the name Cyberlily.”  Faye then pointed at the circuit board, “Fascinated with technology.”

“Wait.”  Kody’s eyes ‘powered’ up and shone white again, “Updating to include Cyberlily.”  they nodded, “There we go.”  They pointed behind themself, “We prefer not to hunt like the others and prey on the guests, I simply ask for blood donations.  Most of the time it is blood bunnies that do it.  We get a few people that come in from the little sign outside.”  They shrugged, “It’s still blood, right?”

 “Casey, want to stay out here and keep our back covered?”  Vivienne offered.

Kody spoke up, “Doctor Moreau, No one really comes in here other than donors.  No need for a lookout.”  They opened a small drawer and pulled out a contact lens case. “Miss Faye, DEDSEC just isn’t obvious about what we work on.”  handing her the case, “I am Kody Hensely, the others here call me ‘Code’.  Feel free to do so.”  They went back to work on the small board.

“What’s in the case?”  Faye inquired as Vivienne walked quietly beside her progeny.

“A heads up display for your eyes, I figured you would be by and just finished them.”  Kody shrugged and offered their hand to Vivienne. “Pleased to finally meet the Raven.”

Faye giggled and plucked a contact out of the blood fused liquid it was in. “This is amazing, graphene leads?”

Shaking the hand offered, Vivienne raised one of her onyx eyebrows, “You don’t seem afraid of me, Code.”

Sighing and placing the tool back on the desk, Kody stood up and flopped their messy brown hair to one side. “I don’t scare easily.”  They shrugged, “It was logical really.  If you were going to use that persona, you would hardly come in and be sociable.  My data suggests that you would have just killed everything and not looked back.”  They pointed to the dress and chiffon cape, “You appear to want to have a pleasant evening, given your elegance.”  They looked at Faye, “Good guess, graphene is a newer concept for transistors, one that humans have yet to exploit properly.”