FicWad

I do not own Underworld or its characters or settings. For these, I would like to thank Len Wiseman, Danny McBride, Kevin Grevioux and Ildiko Kovacs, for her stirring performance as Michael's Old Girlfriend. We only saw the two snapshots, Ms. Kovacs, but we know there must have been many more!

It has come to my attention that there is some question as to whether Selene or Anna Valerious would win in a fight. After much consideration, I have decided that there is only one mature, objective and logical way to settle the matter, but that it would be boring. Instead we shall have an all-text cult character deathmatch.

Yeah, I don't own Van Hellsing either. Thank God.

(interior, an arena)

REFEREE: All right, ladies! I want a good clean fight, so feel free to kick, cheat and rip each other's clothes.

ANNA: Vampire! (cocks crossbow)

SELENE: Prepare yourself for death, human!

VAN HELSING: (from the stands) Are you sure you don't need any help, Anna?

ANNA: No! Shut up!

SELENE: (fires)

ANNA: Eeeep! (dodges and fires crossbow bolt)

MICHAEL: (from the stands) Go Selene!

KAHN: (from the stands) Yeah! Kick her overdressed ass!

VAN HELSING: Quit cheering for that slavering undead!

KAHN: Oh for crud's sake; WE'RE NOT UNDEAD!

MICHAEL: And Selene doesn't slaver ...well, except when she--

KAHN: I don't need to know.

MICHAEL: Okay.

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Taylor worried the metal band at his wrist. He just wasn't used to the damned thing. Back in his other life, he'd only worn a nine-dollar plastic Swatch. Some days. Decent watch, decent shoes, a shirt that was meant to be tucked in and worn just so... And it wasn't just the uniform. Since learning to control his change, he'd grown accustomed to clothes that could be pulled loose with one hand, shoes that he could rip apart or leave behind, nothing tight on any limb or around his neck. Slip off, cut open or cut the loss. Everything on his skin had to be expendable. These clean, stolen clothes just didn't fit.

Especially, Taylor realized as he considered his situation, since everything inside his skin was about to get expended itself.

"The boss is going to kill me," he chanted numbly, "I am going to be very dead soon. The boss is going to kill me and I will soon be very dead because the boss is going to kill me and I-"

"Will you shut up?" demanded Pierce.

"Yes, I will shut up," said Taylor, rocking back and forth as he yanked the tarp down over the car. "When Lucian kills me I will be unable to talk or move or breathe or eat cheeseburgers or-"

"Shut up!" Pierce shouted. "Lucian is going to be fucking pissed that we lost the new mark-"

"-Again."

"No, the first time was Raze and therefore not our fault. We weren't even there. Look, you said yourself that he probably only sent us to the hospital to keep us out of trouble."

"I was wrong. I was very wrong and I will be made very dead when Lucian-"

"Dammit, runt!" Pierce grabbed him by the shoulders and pushing him against the half-open scarred metal. "He's going to be fucking pissed off but he is not actually going to kill us."

"Yes he is," Taylor sighed helplessly, stepping up to the door.

"No he's not," answered Pierce. The security system on the abandoned munitions factory might've been decades out of date, wires chewed away by a posse of distressingly confident rats, but the door was still good steel. Pierce raised his fist and pounded once, nodded at the guard through the slitted window and caught the edge as the heavy frame slid open. "Look, runt," he said wearily, "the boss plays it tough and I know he said something about having our heads for lawn ornaments-"

A soft, high-pitched sound keened from Taylor's closed throat.

"-but he doesn't go around killing his own men, so for fuck's sake, /quit with the/-"

"Umm..." the guard interrupted. "What about when he killed that guy that time for that thing?"

"Wait," Taylor asked in alarm, "what thing? What guy?"

"Oh yeah..." Pierce mused, wincing at the memory. "That was disgusting."

"What was disgusting?" Taylor demanded shrilly.

"Nothing." The older lycan waved one arm dismissively, but Taylor saw an odd twitch in the hollow of his throat. He sniffed experimentally and then swallowed hard. Pierce was sweating, and not because of the cheap-ass hollowfill in the cop jacket.

"Oh," the guard added, "and he asked to see you as soon as you got back."

"What?!"

"Aw fuck," muttered Pierce.
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"Did you learn anything on your return to the hospital?" asked Lucian, turning away from the weapon he was loading. "Has Corvin managed to contact anyone?"

Taylor gulped hard and nodded. Did they really have to have this conversation in the armory? Sure, the boss could probably rip them apart without any help, but all these weapons were giving Taylor's imagination far too many options. He could feel like the twitching in his wrists that this was going to be about as pretty as a forty-five year-old shut-in who thought she still looked good in Spandex. "Yes, boss," he answered.

Lucian's eyebrows shot up expectantly.

"The new mark was already at the hospital when we arrived," Pierce filled in.

All movement in the armory froze. The two guys unpacking the U.V. bullets turned and looked their way. The guy in the back paused on the Uzi he was assembling. Even the dudes playing cards by the coffee machine got way too quiet.

Lucian's eyes grew more intense, still as steady as stones. "So you did find the candidate?"

"Yes, boss." Taylor ducked his chin into nod, trying not to look too much like he was guarding his desiccated throat.

"He was at the hospital?"

"Yes, Lucian," Pierce answered again.

His eyes closed for half a breath. "He got away again," Lucian's voice plucked out each syllable like a tone from a worn-out music box.

"Yes. Went right through the window." Pierce motioned with one hand.

"He got a cab," Taylor volunteered.

"We couldn't track him," added Pierce.

"Really couldn't," Taylor finished quickly. Maybe if they could get him to look at all the extenuating circumstances-

Lucian leaned forward, the tiny crease in his brow growing just a bit darker, "And there were no death dealers this time? No one interfered? He outmaneuvered the two of you without any of our cousins in the way?"

Taylor shook his head, gulping hard. "Yes, boss, he got away on his own."

"Very well..." the lycan master nodded intently. "Carry on."

Taylor had no idea that there was anything in his throat to choke on, but like the resourceful creature he'd had to become, he managed.

"What is it?" Lucian asked sternly. "Help the others prepare and then get some rest."

"Uh..." Taylor stammered, barely feeling Pierce's fist clamp down on his arm. "Thanks?"

"For what?" asked Lucian, turning back to the weapon on the bench in front of him.

"Let's just go!" Pierce hissed, pulling at his arm.

"I just-" Taylor gulped. "I just thought you'd be more upset is all."

"Well I won't say I'm pleased..." Lucian trailed off, picking up the clip and fitting it to its socket. "But at this point it's only a matter of time." A thin smile colored his face. "By now, he's one of us. And if you saw him at the hospital, it means he managed to escape from Selene."

From the corner of his eye, Taylor saw Pierce re-mouth the name. He elbowed him lightly in the ribs. "The one with the two Berettas who thinks she's Pat Benatar," he whispered.

"Thanks," Pierce muttered back.

"And tomorrow night," Lucian snapped the clip home, "he's going to become significantly easier to find. It cuts our timeline a bit close," he explained, like an instructor to some dull children, "and there is the risk of ...collateral damage," he picked the word like a nettle from raw skin, "and exposure, but we will find him in time and this plan will move forward."

Taylor's eyes drifted to the floor, a funny feeling humming around the front of his skull. "Uh..." he breathed out. "Unless he goes back, right?"

Pierce's neck twisted his way, "The fuck are you talking about? Back where?"

"Let him speak," Lucian snapped. Taylor looked up. The boss was frowning. That meant he was thinking and thinking meant he wasn't...

"Well..." Taylor's voice felt like slushing gravel in his throat. He coughed but it didn't help. "Well... he still thinks he's human, right? Don't humans like to feel..." He could sense Pierce's eyes on him. "...safe?"

"Yes, probably," Lucian agreed. "Where are you going with this?"

"We trashed his apartment, and then we showed up at his work," Taylor answered hesitantly. "It's a good bet he don't feel safe there any more." He shrugged, pulling his shoulders to his neck. "What if he goes looking for her?"

"Why would he do some stupid shit like that?" demanded Pierce.

"Pierce," Lucian snapped again. "Go on," he said to Taylor.

The boss' face was as harder to read as the subtitles on a French film. "He probably doesn't know what a death dealer is. She sure as fuck wasn't going to tell him." Something was taking shape. "All we know is that she took him home and she didn't hurt him." Taylor finished. "That makes her one up on us," the thought in his head finally came out, and actually sounded something like it was supposed to. The boss blinked hard and Taylor didn't blame him. He was pretty surprised himself.

It was still really quiet.

Taylor licked his lips. "What if he goes looking for her?" he asked. "We don't know why he ran away, if he ran away." The boss still hadn't moved, hadn't looked away, so Taylor had to. "And if you don't know that she's a silver-packing cryogenic bitch, she is sort of hot," he finished. There was a soft murmur of assent from the guys in the back. "So maybe she's two up on us." Taylor finally met Lucian's eyes. "Hell," he said at last, "it's what I would do..."

"Shit-brained stupid," growled Pierce.

"Fuck you," Taylor shot back.

"That's enough," Lucian's voice was sharp, but calm. He looked from him to Pierce and back. "Finish here. Then get some rest," he said again. "I'm sending you out again tomorrow night."

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ANNA: (tosses aside crossbow and kicks toward Selene's midsection)

SELENE: (grabs Anna's leg and sweeps her)

VAN HELSING: Kill that whore of Satan, Anna!

ANNA: You're just making her mad, Gabriel!

SELENE: (kicks Anna in face)

ANNA: Ow!

VAN HELSING: Send that demonskank back to the abyss!

MICHAEL: Will you shut up already?

VAN HELSING: Make me!

MICHAEL: All right, I will!

Bowf!

Erft!

Ka-thunka k'thunk!

VAN HELSING: ...ow...

SELENE: (shakes head) What a loser.

ANNA: Don't get me started.