"I told you what would happen if I saw you again!"

Oliver's voice booming through the house startled Polina, breaking her from the confusion of Lyn's sudden departure- though it also served to confuse her more. When had the two of them met? And what had happened that would cause the normally calm and composed Oliver to be absolutely furious at just the sight of her.

Uncertainty nearly froze her in place- though she certainly had enough awareness to move to the side so Lyn wasn't directly between them. While she wasn't sure exactly what was going on, she trusted Oliver... and, with a shotgun appearing in his hands, she didn't want to be to be in the line of fire.

She was certain Oliver would never risk hurting her, but if Lyn was dangerous... Yeah, better to get clear.

"This isn't what it looks like, Oli!" Lyn said, somewhat frantically, hands held defensively in front of herself.

"Yeah? So you mean you didn't befriend my girlfriend just to get close to me?" He shot back with a sarcastic snarl. "You know, exactly what I warned you not to do with threats of death and dismemberment?"

It clicked for Poli with that statement. He had told her about everything: the System, the Bounties he had completed... and even the very dire threats he had made after one of his friends had been kidnapped. Threats made to a vampire.

And, as far as she knew, that was the only person he had threatened so thoroughly- on this planet, at least.

She could see that Oliver was on the edge of violence, and the situation was about to rapidly devolve... and the FBI was possibly listening. While no one had said anything that could cause problems- not yet, at least- she knew it was only a matter of time before someone did, or the shooting started.

"Stop!" Her shout drew both their attention to her briefly, though Oliver's eyes never left Lyn- Eve, she corrected herself mentally, as she was now sure that was her real name. Her mind spun with uncertainty- she doubted she could really stop this from being an issue, so how could she go about changing it so as to bring fewer problems down on all of them?

"I think we all need to take a second to cool down so we can address this problem." She spoke quickly, an idea forming. Seeing the look of disbelief cross Oliver's face, and a small glimmer of relief and hope from Eve, she pressed on quickly. "I think we should all go for a drive. Ok?"

"Poli..." Oliver ground out through gritted teeth. "You don't understand! She's-"

"I know, Oli." She interrupted him, shifting loser to him and lowering her voice. "But our home isn't the place for this..."

"And I would prefer if people didn't hear a disturbance and decide to call the Police, ok?" She added, hoping he would understand.

After a second of searching her face for answers, Oliver briefly glanced towards the kitchen in understanding. He hadn't gotten around to checking the card again to see if the enchantment was fading, so he had no way of knowing if the FBI were still listening in- assuming that is what the enchantment did to begin with, though he felt fairly sure of it. "Fine. Let's go."

When the gun disappeared from his hands, Eve let out a small sigh of relief- while it wouldn't cause a lot of damage to her by itself, in such an enclosed space it would be good enough to delay her and allow Oliver to get close... And she really didn't want to get cut up by that freaky purple sword of his.

"Look, I appreciate you trying to defuse the situation, Poli..." She said as she began shifting towards the back door. "But I don't know about-"

"Lyn." Polina scowled. "If you just leave like this, it will only make things worse. At this point, you've already screwed up... and Oli isn't going to forget it."

"Now, unless you want me pissed off as well, you should shut up and get in the car!"

Eve's shoulders sunk as she sighed, and her voice dropped to a whisper- though she started walking slowly towards the car. "You know he's going to kill me, right?"

With Oliver watching Eve like a hawk, Poli closed the door behind them. "Yeah... but, if you ran, it would still happen- it would just take longer. This conversation is the only chance you have to avoid that..."

The tension in the car was so thick it nearly had a physical weight to it- or so Polina felt as she drove with the two of them in the backseat. When the glowing purple Psi Blade appeared in Oliver's hand, its edge already laid across Eve's throat, she couldn't help but sigh.

She really didn't want a mess like that in her car. She was still paying the damn thing off!

"Give me one good reason why I shouldn't kill you." He growled out.

Unlawfully taken from Royal Road, this story should be reported if seen on Amazon.

"I wasn't going to hurt her!" Eve exclaimed, staring wide eyed at the blade- she remembered how easily it had cut through her arm and, while she had gotten stronger, she really didn't want to test it. With her neck, no less. "And I wasn't trying to hurt you either! I swear!"

"Yeah right!" Oliver scoffed. "Why else would you-"

"I believe her, Oli."

Polina's soft words cut him off cleanly, and he turned a stunned gaze her direction. "What!? How could you believe that after what she did? She kidnapped T and threatened to kill him!"

"I know." Poli sighed, shaking her head. "But she's also incredibly insecure and lonely, and she latched on to the one person she felt any kind of a connection to- meaning you, hon. This is her being a creepy stalker, not a murderous monster."

"What? Why would she-"

"Hey! I am not insecure! Or a creepy stalker!"

Poli ignored their exclamations- and the glare Oliver threw at Eve- and spoke over both of them. "I'm still piecing things together, but it's kinda obvious."

They fell silent behind her as she spoke on. "Let me know if I've got all this right... Eve, you dealt with being ostracized and hated as a Romani, and ended up in a concentration camp. Then your whole family died in front of you, you got turned into a vampire and started murdering people... And that left you isolated and alone again..."

"Kinda hard to make friends when you eat people..." Eve grumbled softly.

Poli was thankful that Oliver chose to remain silent. "The part that I'm not to sure about is... Why not other vampires? Are the movie cliches right and all of them are self-centered assholes that will manipulate and use even their own kind?"

"Yeah, pretty much." Eve sighed. "I mean, it's not all of them. My sire tends to avoid others and do his own thing because he hates the stupid politics and power struggles, too... Because that's what it is all about to most of them: Power, pure and simple. Power over mundanes like you. Power over each other... Hell, some of the older vamps like to mess around with the government types because of the power involved- I'm pretty sure some of them had a hand in causing the Civil War; some because they like the chaos of war, and some just because they like controlling people, so slavery is right in their wheel house..."

"Well, they did until the government started putting together groups to deal with that kind of meddling..."

"You mean like the Paranormal Investigation Division of the FBI?" Oliver ground out, still angry over everything. Yeah, he could sympathize a little with Eve's past- a little- but that didn't excuse her barging into his life and causing chaos! First Tyrone, now Polina... The more he thought about it, the more the anger flared inside him...

And emotions were difficult to deal with, he was discovering...

"Let's not get off track, here." Polina sighed softly, feeling the bubbling torrent that was Oliver's emotional state.

"So, to sum it up, Eve was emotionally traumatized and isolated by things completely out of her control... Then she meets a man that is just as fucked up as she is."

"No offense, Oli. I love who you are, but even you admit that you are pretty fucked up."

"So... for the first time in almost a century, she makes a weird emotional connection. I'm not going to claim I really understand the how of it exactly, because people deal with emotional trauma in their own ways... and I have no idea how being a vampire affects stuff like that... But she turned creepy stalker and wants to get close to the guy she has a crush on- which is probably her first real crush in a hundred years, if ever."

"Does that sound about right Eve?"

She could see clearly in the rear view mirror that Eve was pouting, though the small woman did nod eventually.

"I mean, I guess?" Eve shrugged slightly, wincing as the blade cut into her neck just a bit. "I never really had a crush before... We moved around too much for me to ever get close to someone. Maybe there was one girl I kinda had a thing for?"

She sighed softly as she slumped in the seat. "Please don't explain why you say I'm insecure. I really don't like having all my flaws just thrown out like this, and I'm pretty sure you have a reason for saying that."

"It's all the sexual comments." Oliver grunted, still trying to wrap his brain around the whole thing. He could kinda understand it. She was fucked up and didn't know how to deal with it... Hell, that was something he was personally familiar with. But she didn't have the same options he did- like therapy.

Or having a mother there to help. It almost made him feel sorry for her.

"What?" Eve asked in surprise. "I mean, I just said I don't want to know... But how the hell do you get that I'm insecure just because I make a few comments?"

"You mask the insecurity by being overtly sexual." Oliver said softly, hating that he was starting to relate to the blood thirsty bitch. "Well, the insecurity as well as the fear and trauma... I hid mine by being cold and quiet; it may have made me the weird kid in high school, but people don't really look that closely at the weird kid... So it was easier to hide the problems..."

"You seriously need therapy, Eve."

Eve's nostrils flared with anger. "Yeah? And how am I supposed to do that exactly? 'Oh, yeah, nice therapist! I was alive during World War 2 and I drink blood to survive!' Yeah, I'm sure that would go over well! They would try to lock me up for shit like that!"

"Eve..." Poli sighed. Oliver had just started to calm down, and she didn't want this to turn back to arguing and shouting. "None of that excuses your actions, it just explains them. And honestly, I'm not really happy about all of this either. You spent the last month lying to me in the hopes of getting close to Oli... Yeah, I can see your reasons for doing it. You're hoping that he will understand and accept you, maybe even love you- though you probably don't feel like you deserve it..."

"This isn't the point for you to jump in, Oli." She added softly as he opened his mouth. "You did something very similar not that long ago, didn't you?"

Seeing the pained and embarrassed look on his face at being reminded, she reached back with one hand and place it on his knee. "I'm not mad, love. I just... see a lot of similarities between the two of you. And I think you need to see them, too."

"But... I trust you to do what is best to keep us safe. No matter what that is."

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