Walking down the stairs was painful, she decided. It was so slow - so inefficient. And right now, it was dragging on her nerves. She was still out of sorts after what had happened, but she felt the need to walk about like she was normal - alive - in case of Aaron. She grumbled about it under her breath as Muse headed into the kitchen. As she walked in, she heard a thump from next to her. She saw Eric sitting on the floor, staring up at her wide-eyed.

“Seriously! Stop doing that! I'm really freakin' sick of that stunt." Eric shot her a glare.

Muse chuckled. “I actually just walked in that time, I swear. I just don’t think you noticed.” She reached down to help him. He took her hand and stood up with a disgruntled mutter.

Eric slumped back onto the stool he had just abruptly vacated. He grasped a half-empty glass in one hand and took a drink. He coughed, then wiped his hand across his forehead. He looked like he was sick. Muse raised an eyebrow at him, then saw the answer - a bottle of vodka sat on the counter next to him.

“Is Victor okay?” Muse asked, watching him. The man was very clearly trashed.

“I guess,” Eric said and sipped at the glass. “Sorry," he said darkly, staring down into the clear liquid in his glass.

“About?”

“What happened to you,” he replied, taking another sip of the glass and letting out a long exaggerated breath.

“Yeah... whatever. It didn’t hurt,” Muse said with a small shrug. She wasn't going to tell him how much it had taken out of her. Bent over a glass of vodka, it looked like he had plenty of his own problems.

“What exactly happened?” Eric shot down the rest of the glass of vodka, blinked and shook his head. He poured himself a fresh glass.

“I’m not exactly sure... The old woman-"

“Zadkiel," he grunted out.

“Right. She stuck me in the bottle, I guess... I’m not sure. Everything just went black.”

“Huhn.” Eric shifted his gaze from his glass to the granite. His body was caught with a shiver for a moment - some sort of nervous reaction.

The poor bastard. Muse walked around to the stool next to him and sat down on it, sitting close to him. She reached out and put her hand on his shoulder, frowning. “What happened?” She got no answer. She sighed and rubbed his back lightly. "You're going to fry your circuits with all that vodka." That at least got a laugh out of him, even if it was only one laugh. She paused and stroked his hair back slightly. "Hun, you don't look like you've slept."

“Haven’t.”

“How long?"

“Dunno.”

“What happened?” Again, nothing but a quiet grunt. She turned his head to look at her, making him focus his bleary eyes on hers. “Eric. C’mon. Please.”

“Victor, he," he started, but his voice cracked into a small whine, and he shook his head. Whatever it was that had happened, he obviously didn't want to relive it.

“He’s okay?" she pressed.

“Yeah, but.. he...”

“He what?”

“Wasn’t human...” Eric finally stammered quietly. He lowered his head even further. Slouching his shoulders over the counter, he gripped the glass with both hands, holding onto it like it was the only secure thing he had in the world. Muse blinked, completely unsure of what to say.

“What? Hun... he’s a vampire," she stated the obvious.

“No. I mean, he.. He-” Eric sighed and climbed off of the stool suddenly. He staggered a bit, and gripped the countertop with one hand, steadying himself. Picking up the bottle of vodka and started out of the room. His gait wasn't exactly straight, but he managed to make it through the door by sheer willpower. He clearly needed to get away - to get out. Muse could only watch. What was she going to do, pin him to the ground and force it out of him?

“I can’t.” Eric disappeared down the hallway without another word.

Muse sat there staring at the door for a long time, lost in thought. She needed to know what had happened. There was only one person who'd know - really know - what was going on. Whether or not he told her was another matter entirely. She really desperately didn't want to go up there, but she had no other options at this point.

She sighed and decided it was only a matter of time. He said he needed to talk to you, anyway. No use avoiding it. Taking the unusually-long-feeling-walk up the stairs, she stood at his door and knocked.

“Enter,” came the simple reply.

She rolled her eyes at the formality of it, and stepped inside, shutting the door behind her. She found him at his desk, writing away in a book. As usual. He held his glasses in one hand, slowly spinning the wire between his fingers as he wrote.

“Hello, Muse,” Isaac said quietly and put his pen down. She wondered how he knew it was her. Probably has committed the sound of knocks to memory… seems neurotic enough for him. He picked up a glass of water off of his desk and took a sip as he swiveled around to look at her. “You’re up and around. Good. Faster than I predicted,” he said simply.

“Glad I impress you,” Muse replied. They stayed in silence for a long moment, her not sure what to say, and him waiting. He eventually arched one eyebrow at her quizzically. "Uh..." she finally spoke. "So... um, Eric's a mess." She shoved her hands in her pockets. She hated how Isaac looked at her. Like he was always judging her, always taking stock of her. It was, if she admitted it to herself, intimidating.

“He’s having trouble accepting what his brother did, I expect,” Isaac said and turned back around to face his desk again, rearranging the papers around on the glass surface, looking for something specific. "I believe that Eric neither fully understands, nor accepts his brother's condition. A pity, as they will both have to come to terms with it. They are only prolonging the inevitable."

Muse let that sink in for a while. Sure, she would live forever - or, rather, exist forever - but she had no family, no one she was really attached to. Victor would watch his brother age and die. Eric would watch his brother change into something other than human. Heavy. She watched Isaac as he shuffled through papers. "So... do you want to tell me what Victor did?"

“Hrm. He didn’t explain it to you.” Isaac lifted his head slightly from where he sat for a moment, staring off thoughtfully before resuming searching around through his papers.

“No. Think he was too upset to be sober and too drunk to process.” Muse walked over to the fireplace, looking at the pictures arranged on the shelf. Many of him, posing alone or with others. Some were colored, but most were black and white, aged yellow with time. She picked up one - it had to have been from the thirties. Some looked… much older. Damn it, he was older than her. Of course, he always had to be right. "Cute pictures." She placed the frame back on the fireplace with a small click.

"Thank you." He sounded amused.

Muse smiled lightly, glad she got some reaction out of him.

"Muse, we need to speak." He sounded horribly like her father at that moment. Well, okay, considerably more well-spoken than her dad ever was, and Isaac swore less. But the tone was there. When she looked in his direction, he motioned her closer.

She chewed on her lip for a moment, nervous. She was going to get yelled at, she knew it. Finally working up the nerve, she walked up to his desk and sat down on the edge of it, keeping a few feet from him. She kept her eyes fixed pointedly on the floor. Her blue hair fell in front of her face, as usual, further obscuring him.

Isaac leaned back in the chair and looked over at her. "You endangered yourself, Eric and Victor, by rushing off on that fool’s errand. You should have spoken to me. This could all have been prevented."

"I know."

"I am aware that Eric most likely pressured you into rushing in headlong after his brother. If something like this were to ever happen again, I expect you to report it to me. I cannot have half of my employees being disabled in one fell swoop. That would have left me with only Mal and Ezekiel... Truly Muse, take some pity on me."

Muse looked up at him, seeing a rare smirk on his face. She was surprised at his joke and found herself smiling. She didn’t feel like telling him that she didn’t exactly fuss about going along with Eric. She had volunteered and had insisted, no less. That would require admitting that she felt some sort of connection to them.

"Do I have your word?"

"Yeah."

"Good." Isaac seemed satisfied with her answer and went back to the current problem at hand. He picked up a stack of papers tied together with a thin piece of string, undid the knot and started to leaf through them.

“So really, what happened? You're the only one who'll talk to me right now.” Her attention slipped to the papers Isaac was searching through. They were all covered in the same handwriting - she assumed it was his. The black script was, as she expected, precise and exact. She saw various lists, charts, some doodles of circles with strange writing and symbols all over them. She even thought for a moment she saw a grocery list go by.

“Eric witnessed his brother in a primal fit of hunger," Isaac began, his attention was still on the papers. "He tore the Crusaders apart, rather literally. Eric is having trouble coming to terms with what his brother is capable of.”

“Oh.”

Isaac looked up at her for a moment as if expecting her to say more, then looked back down at his work. Honestly, she didn’t know what else to say. She couldn’t really comprehend what he had said - ‘tore the Crusaders apart, literally.’ The only thing she had to compare it to was the violence she had witness Isaac unleash. She didn’t want to think about Victor being capable of something that matched that level of gore.

Isaac sighed quietly, clearly becoming annoyed that whatever he was looking for was eluding him. Muse studied the carpet from where she was atop the desk, lost in thought. There was something she wanted to say, but she couldn't quite grasp hold of what it was. They sat in silence for a while, before Isaac gently sat down the stack of papers. He leaned back in his chair and looked up at her.

“Muse. Logic or fear has never held your tongue before. Speak.”

“Huhn?" She looked up at him, caught off guard.

“Whatever it is you wish to say, go ahead.”

"It's just that-" Muse paused, attempting to gather her thoughts. Isaac watched her patiently as she turned them over in her head. She cared about Eric and Victor. She hated to see Eric screwed up, and she had been frantic over Victor. These people were hit men - monsters and murderers - and she was being held captive by a sorcerer. She wasn't supposed to care about them. She remembered there was some kind of name for that symptom when you got attached to somebody who held you prisoner, but she couldn't remember it now. That's what she got for not paying attention in Psych class.

When she was honest with herself, she liked it here. And she didn't know if that was okay.

"Go on."

Screw it. Whatever. He can't humiliate you any more than he already has. She took a breath and let out the first few words in a rush of air. “I've been thinking. Especially with what's just happened - with Eric, and Victor. I’ve started to like everyone here, more or less. The guys are great fun. It’s... a nice change. I spent - I don’t know how long - in a graveyard by myself with no attachments. Here... yes... it may not be altogether pleasant, but it’s not exactly... boring.”

Muse kept her eyes fixed on the floor. Isaac always seemed to know too much about the people around him and their thoughts. No matter how hard she tried to hide them, Isaac knew. She could only imagine how much that had pissed off Aaron as a child. She also suspected she showed her emotion easily on her face. She probably should work on that, but a part of her didn’t care.

Isaac steepled his fingers in front of his face and watched her intently from over the rim of his glasses.

Muse kept going, suddenly feeling like she was talking to the weirdest therapist ever. “One of the Crusaders - Zadkiel. She called you my master. She pointed... she pointed out that willing or not, I’m still your slave. It was kind of a rude reminder that I don’t have a choice here.”

“You don’t. As crass as she phrased it, yes. That hasn’t changed.” He stood up and moved to stand in front of her where she sat on his desk. He placed a finger under her chin and tilted her face up to look at him. “Your current predicament is still as it was months ago.”

Muse pulled her head away from his hand. To say she felt torn was to put it mildly. She liked being there... but she didn’t like being forced to be there.

“But if you prefer to sulk over the terms of your tenure here, and not look at it as the opportunity that it is, so be it. It doesn’t change anything except how miserable you are. If you choose to be miserable, I suppose that is your prerogative.”

“Hun, I’m a goth. I’m really good at being miserable. It’s kind of our job.” She shot him a cynical smirk.

A bare smile crossed his face. “I never doubted your ability for a moment.”

Muse vanished into mist and slipped across the floor away from him. It was all overwhelming. She reappeared by a bookcase, folding her arms around herself. Isaac sat back down in his chair. “But that doesn’t mean I like this situation," she insisted, if only for her own dignity. She didn't want to admit that she liked them at all. She didn't want to admit that this was starting to feel like home. Muse - as childish as it might be - didn't want to be 'okay' with her situation.

“Of course. You’re simply making do with the hand you’ve been dealt.” Isaac swiveled the chair around and resumed his work. She thought she saw a smile on his face as he picked up his pen and began to write on a clean sheet of paper. If he knew the game she was playing with herself, he seemed content to let her play it.

“Exactly.” Muse paused for a long moment and watched Isaac, thinking. She slowly resigned herself to the fact there was nothing more she could say and gripping the doorknob, she left him to his papers.

Eric grumbled under his breath as he focused up at the underside of his car. He wiped an oily hand across his forehead, further smearing the black substance across his skin. Pulling the wrench out of his mouth, Eric began to tug and yank on a stubborn bolt on the underside of his precious possession's front end. Stay busy. That was the answer to all life’s problems. Or stay drunk. Right now it was stay busy - his stomach finally expressed its annoyance with the latter.

“Hey Eric,” Victor chimed next to the car, watching Eric’s legs twitch in surprise from where he lay underneath the vehicle.

“Oh. Hey Vic.”

“You want any help?” he asked gently.

“No, last time you helped me with a project I had to scrap it and start over because you spilled my root beer in it,” Eric said with a grunt - glad he couldn't see his brother from under the car. He twisted at another bolt, giving up on the stubborn one for the time being.

“Hey, it wasn’t my fault you left it sitting there,” Victor insisted.

“Yeah, well, you’re the one who knocked it in.”

“Still.” Eric saw his brother sit down on the ground out of the corner of his eye - sitting with his back against the wheel well. Victor sat there in silence for a long time.

“Hey, do me a favor?” Eric finally asked.

“Yeah,” Victor replied morosely.

“Hand me that jar next to you, would you?” Eric pointed aimlessly towards a small jar sitting on the cement tile. It skittered across the cement towards him a moment later.

Silence fell over the garage as Eric continued to work on his car. Eric was perfectly happy going on like nothing had happened - that’s how he ran his life. It probably wasn’t healthy, bottling up all trauma and conflict and putting it on his to-do list, (which usually resulted in broken furniture later on,) but that’s just how he operated.

Unfortunately, Victor knew better. “Hey... Eric?”

“Yeah?”

Victor paused for a long time before he worked up the guts. “Do you hate me?”

“What the hell kind of question is that, Vic?” Eric snorted from under the car. “If this is still about the root beer I-”

“It’s about what I did to the Crusaders.”

“Oh,” Eric replied slowly. "I..." Eric went silent and stared up at the car, glad he didn't have to look his brother in the face. He could let the look of disgust cross his features without insulting him. "I don't know."

“You do hate me.” Victor sighed and shut his eyes. “I don’t blame you. I mean... that was-”

“I don’t hate you, Vic. I just... don't know.” Eric shut his eyes, holding onto the exhaust pipe of his car, glad he had something to squeeze.

“What do you mean, you don’t know?”

“I just don’t know, man. I don’t know what to think about what happened.” Eric had just managed to shut out the nightmares - enough booze had done that. He wanted everything to stay gone, wanted everything to go back to the way it was. He had to just keep busy.

“Radu said-"

“I don’t care what Radu said. That guy’s a creep and an asshole and I don’t like him,” Eric snapped. That stupid vampire ‘Prince’ always came up when Victor felt defensive like Victor was some sort of school kid sucking up to a senior classman. Eric hated Radu, to be honest. Despised him. He never trusted anyone that slick. And he didn't like what Radu was doing to Victor. He was just making him more of a monster.

“Well, he’s the only one who can tell me about what’s going on with me!” Victor snapped angrily. Part of Eric understood that - the other part didn’t understand why Victor needed the help.

“Or at least he’s tricked you into thinking that.” Eric knew the argument was useless but didn't want to admit it. His brother was Radu's 'understudy' of sorts, and he knew that Radu would be there to help him long after - Eric cringed at the idea - he himself had died of old age.

“He’s helping me.”

“Right. Sure he is.”

“Eric, you've gotta understand. It’s like I’ve got this thing inside me that I have to keep fed, and if I don’t... it does... it does that.”

“I offered to help you find a cure when you got turned. I could have fixed you."

Victor groaned. “We’ve been over this!”

“Yeah, we have. And maybe if you had taken me up on my offer!” He clenched the exhaust pipe in his hands, as it kept him from doing what he really wanted to do, which was hit his idiot brother.

“Offer to what? Turn me into some cyborg?! That was your idea. ‘Let’s replace entire sections of your body and blood with some wacky technology you don’t understand.’ Great. Great idea,” Victor railed. "I would have been a freak just the same! I just would have been a toaster oven instead of a vampire."

"Oh, so being like me is worse than being a vampire?! You really think that little of me?!"

"Eric - for fuck's sake-"

"It would have worked. You would be human. Mortal! You wouldn't be eating people!"

“Yeah, it all worked really well on your last girlfriend.”

“Low. Low, Vic. Really low.” Eric squeezed the pipe harder - wanting to keep from screaming. The back of his neck was hot with the rage suddenly flooding him. He knew he was leaving dents in the pipe with his robotic arm. He'd have to replace the whole pipe, but right now it kept him from breaking something else.

“It’s the truth," Victor said quietly.

“Shut up,” Eric snapped fiercely. “You just crossed a line so just - just - shut up.”

Victor sighed and stood up, and began to pace around. “You still blame me for that, too.” He threw his hands up helplessly.

Eric took a long time to reply. Too long. “No.”

“Yes, you do! Don’t lie. I deserve more than to be lied to."

“Okay. Yes, I do blame you for what happened to her,” Eric snapped bitterly. He shut his eyes tightly. He wanted to wrench the pipe loose with his bare hands and beat his brother with it - just to get him to shut up. This was all too distracting - too much stupid crap being dredged up at once.

“There.” Victor picked up a rag and started twisting it in his hands. “You’re disgusted by what I did to the Crusaders.”

“Yeah. Yeah, I am. It’s taken two weeks to get those images to stop showing up every time I shut my eyes. I still have nightmares. It was messed up, Vic. What you did was messed up.”

"I know, but-"

"It wasn't human, Vic."

"I'm not human!" Victor chucked the rag at the wall. He took in a deep breath and let it out, defeated. “I can’t help what I am, Eric.”

Eric shut his eyes and groaned as he heard the door slam shut behind Victor. Eric kept his eyes shut - and, knowing he was alone, let himself cry.