Rappaccini's Daughter - Pick Up

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Cammie arrives at the warehouse, where she finds...Jake. She tries to kick his ass. Unfortunately, that's when the bad guys show up.



The drive had been a long one with only her thoughts to keep her company.

The only time Cammie had stopped had been to fill the tank (she paid with cash) and use the bathroom and buy a gallon anti-freeze for her, not the car. She didn't need directions, even after three years she knew the way like the back of her hand. She was going home, guided by that instinct that children had and that stirring in her stomach that wasn't quite fear as the scenery became familiar.

She didn't want anyone to see her, but that was beside the point. When she was about a mile from the warehouse she pulled off the road into one of the farm fields. Cammie found a spot, and without fear of the nearby cows, she covered the car in hay, until you could mistake it for another wrecked bail.

She knew who owned this farm and since the routine hadn't changed when she had been growing up she was counting on it staying the same.

Matthews, the old goat of a farmer, wouldn't be by until near dusk. That was more than enough time to walk to Kurtzberg & Lieber, kill someone, save her parents and then come back to get the car. Carmilla was not staying in Grand Falls any longer than that. As she walked, memories assaulted her but she pushed them aside. The old warehouse had closed about five years ago and had been used by the local kids from here and the other three surrounding farming towns as a party spot. She even remembered a few of those parties. She had accepted a dare from a drunken friend to down a bottle of Vodka after it had become apparent to just about everyone that she was really hard to get drunk.

Now Cammie knew why. Now they all knew why. She was a freak, a killer and a monster. She must have been to cross someone so much that they'd do this.

She kicked a beer can. Recent. Likely a pre-prom party. She stifled the urge to drink whatever was left and kept on going. Only a moron walked right in, she managed to climb up a nearby tree and then look in some of the upper windows.

Cammie let out the breath she was holding, she didn't see her parents in the main part, but it didn't mean they weren't in one of the offices or a bathroom. But they weren't tied up right there. Good. They wouldn't have to see their only child torture someone to death for hurting them.

She made her way back to the ground slowly. The only way in without making a lot of noise was the front door. Her parents' fingers in her pocket she opened the door to the warehouse that smelled like must and beer. Her steps in were cautious, watching out for anything and everything.

Either they weren't here at the moment, in which case she'd happily wait or they were in a back room. Either way, as long as she stayed alert, Cammie felt she had the advantage. She walked in a bit more and looked for a hiding place.

She was going to murder whoever had her parents.

Grand Falls was barely more than a blip in the road, the kind of small town that had once been important in some way, that had moved on to being quaint when the industry had dried up, and was now nothing more than a collection of brick facades and worn-down businesses.

Jake hated every inch of it.

To be fair, he hated everything right now--the combination House of Vacuums/VideoMart, the sad Art Deco courthouse, the excessively slow driver in front of him, the bastards who'd taken his arm and started chopping off pieces of it. Although he was trying to not think about that part right now, because thinking about it would invariably lead to turning the car around, driving into Canada and getting on the first flight to Outer Mongolia. Instead he was listing everything he hated in an effort to distract himself.

The area the warehouse was located in was far enough from downtown to feel deserted, although whether that was a byproduct of the town being in the bust stage of its cycle, he couldn't have said. Regardless, there was no one in sight. He parked the car and got out, keeping watch for movement or any sign that there was anyone around. Nothing moved. Apprehensively, he pulled off his sunglasses and stepped inside.

The sound of the door had Cammie turning around. And her eyes widened and then narrowed, "You! You think this is fucking funny?!" she charged, hands balled into fists, ready to start pounding. She couldn't believe this! Did he think it was a joke?

He blinked, frowning. "Ishmael?" Something was seriously wrong here, but before he had the chance to figure it out, he was forced to duck as Cammie took a swing at him.

That swing had been a sucker, she hit him in the face with the second one. She was paying close attention to all her lessons with Logan and showed, "Fuck. You. You sick fucker!" Poison proof or not, that blow was going to sting, especially given that she followed it with a hard kick right at the family jewels.

"Where are they!?" Cammie demanded.

Just in time, he'd remembered their conversation in the hallway of the mansion when she'd accidentally gassed him, and so the kick to the balls didn't hurt him nearly as much as it could have. The shot to the face, however, left him seeing double. He stumbled backwards, trying to put some distance between himself and the raging green haired girl. "Stop," he tried, holding up one hand to try to ward her off.

"You pull this shit and you can't even hold your own?!" Cammie demanded, indignant. The least he could give her was a decent fight. She deserved that much. "What kind of asshole are you?!"

Jake kept moving backwards, angling to put an old piece of machinery between them. "What are you talking about? What are you doing here?!"

"Oh wow, if I only had a camera."

The nasal voice was familiar to both Cammie and Jake as its owner stepped out from behind a pile of stacked crates. If anyone's physical appearance could match their voice perfectly, this man certainly took the prize. Skinny and appearing to be in his forties, with perhaps a week's worth of stubble on his face and both hands jammed into the pockets of a faded labcoat, he stood no taller than Cammie, but carried himself with a cocky confidence.

"Carmilla, Junior. I can see you've met. I'm George."

The sound of chambers being loaded on semi-automatic weapons from the corners of the room announced that George hadn't come alone to this particular meeting. "And these are Omar and Bradley. Or Brad and Marley. I can't keep them straight. What can you do, huh?"

Cammie had been so intent on pounding any life she could out of Jake that she hadn't even heard the guys come in. But she knew the voice. She let go of Jake and took a step away from him, the look on her face one of pure confusion. Cammie was never a slow kid, but this was one of those moments where her mind just couldn't process events.

"What. The. Fuck. Is. Going on," Cammie said, with just a look over at Jake. Her hands went behind her back and she started pulling off the bandages slowly.

Jake glanced at Cammie, then back to George, then at the two thugs in the wings. They were really, really screwed. He took a small step towards Cammie, ready to grab her and run if need be. "What's she doing here, George? I thought we were going to talk alone."

George drew his hands out of his pockets, spreading them with an apologetic look on his face. "Two birds, one stone, you know? It's called multitasking. Carmilla, darling, these nice men have been hired to bring you back to the people I work for. They'd really like it if this happened without incident."

One of the large gunmen stepped from the shadows, looming over George. "Mister Tarleton? Who's this? The girl was supposed to come alone."

George rolled his eyes and put a hand inside his jacket. "Omar, bubbeleh, no one paid you to think. The folks at New Son made an arrangement for you to pick up Miss Black there, right?"

"That's the contract, yeah," Omar agreed, moving to aim his gun towards Cammie and Jake. "Those were the terms."

With a sigh, George shrugged with his free hand, pulling a small pistol out from his coat. The shot was almost like a cough as he pulled the trigger, and a spray of blood erupted from Omar's knee.

"I'm altering them," he said in the same chirpy voice he'd been speaking in, as if he'd not just crippled a large man with a fully automatic weapon. "Consider this my resignation."

Cammie flinched but didn't scream. She had seen people get shot before. Okay, she had to think clearly around this. This guy had just shot someone. She was out numbered. And as worried as she was about her parents there was a voice in the back of her head telling her she had been suckered. She should've demanded that her parents be here.

If everyone was armed, even with Omar down and out that left George and Contestant number two for sure with a gun.

George wasn't the only one packing a surprise though. One thing to clarify first, "My parents aren't here, are they?!" she snapped, only a bit of desperation leaking into her voice.

Jake took another step towards Cammie, eyes never leaving George. Things were going from bad to worse. George was clearly ready to start shooting, and Cammie was about a minute away from losing it. He had a sinking feeling that he was going to end up shot, or worse, before the night was out.

"Hey hey hey!" George said, ducking as a gunshot rang out from the corner of the room, sending splinters flying from the crate by his head. "Can we worry about your mommy and daddy later? I'm being shot at here! Don't go anywhere!"

He stuck his head up briefly to shout at the unseen second gunman. "Dammit, Brad... Marley... whoever! I'm trying to have a civil conversation here! Do! You! Mind?" - he punctuated the last three words with gunshots fired blindly over the crate as he looked back at Jake and Cammie. "New Son, huh? Tons of money for bioresearch, absolute shit for human resources. Look, you two really need to come with me, seriously."

"Why the hell would we do that?" Jake shot back. There was a large piece of machinery between them and the door, one that looked heavy enough to provide cover from both George and the New Son flunky. He grabbed Cammie by the shoulder and started to push her in that direction; if they could get to cover, they could get out of here.

"Hey!" she cried as Jake grabbed her. Everyone just needed to stop and take a step back so they could get to the bottom of it, namely where the fuck her parents were. She took a deep breath. She knew a way to get everyone to at least shut up. The warehouse was an enclosed area.

She released and then pushed, the goal being to clear as much out of her arm as possible into the air. It came out in a wispy green cloud. The smell didn't bother her, but it would just about everyone else. Once she was in charge here she'd figure everything out.

George immediately began coughing and hacking, staggering out into the open. The other New Son gunman moved forward, aiming his weapon - until the edge of the noxious cloud reached him. Almost instantly, he dropped his gun and began clawing at his throat, skin already turning a waxy shade of pale.

Coughing and hacking, George glared at Cammie through bleary eyes - yet he wasn't falling down in a convulsing heap like his former comrade. "Dammit!" he rasped, spitting out a mouthful of saliva. "Carmilla. Come over here right now and... *hack* ... ah shit..."

Dropping to his knees, George Tarleton began dry-heaving, dropping his gun to the floor. "Goddamn biotoxins..."

This was the result of learning to hold things in, when she did put off more than a little and it didn't have a bloodstream to go right into it did this. The ballless asshole could take it, she knew that. The fact that 'George' was still standing though, that freaked her out.

"No!" Cammie said, who did he think he was, really? Her father? She apparently had her parents fingers with her and right now calling Kurt, apologizing for hitting him and asking for help sounded a lot better than taking her chances with a guy who could take what should've been a near lethal dose and still be talking. She stepped back, and almost fell over, light headed herself from the effort expended. She had gotten the idea weeks ago after running into Ballless for the first time.

She started towards the door, grabbing Jake by the shirt collar, too panicked to stay here and happily go this guy. It was time to take her chances and call for some back up, "Let's go. Now," she said tiredly.

The shapeshifter glared at her, too busy not breathing in the toxin and milking his bloodstream for oxygen to bother saying anything, but his annoyance changed to exasperation as he realized that she could barely walk. One last glance over his shoulder confirmed that George was still kneeling in the middle of the floor, overwhelmed by Cammie's toxin and not likely to make it out of the building before they got to the car. He slipped an arm under Cammie's, half-supporting, half-dragging her out the door before things could get any worse.