Continued from part 1/2.

"The *what*?" Nick asked, eyes wide.

Celeste opened the door, and he took a step away.  "Don't worry," she said
smoothly, "no one's in there right now, and we have no intention of keeping
you prisoner."  She gave him a subtly distressing smile.

"I think that Jess woman should be locked in there," Nick muttered.

Celeste shrugged.  "She's not that bad," she said.  "Yet.  Let's see the
basement next.  You've already seen LaCroix's kick-arse suite, and the rest
of the floors are just offices, and offices converted to bedrooms.
Borrrr-ing."

Nick bit his lower lip.  "Uh, I don't know.  Maybe I should just go back up
to --"

"Nonsense!" Celeste said.  "Ever since I figured out you were *Nick*, I've
wanted to give you a tour.  C'mon.  And stop doing that, you might hurt
LaCroix's face."

Nick followed behind her, glancing this way and that.  This time he noted
another Cousin sticking her head around the corner and watching them as they
walked by.  It was Tserisa.  She was strange -- she had a burro and a weird
haircut -- but she was familiar.

"Hey," she said.  "What's up?"

"Just showing Nick around CERK," Celeste said.

Tser nodded, but looked a little suspicious.  Was letting Nick in on the
layout of the building the safest thing to be doing?  He was noble, but
nobility only existed so far in the War.  She waved around the paint brush
she was holding.  "Well, when you're done, Celeste, we need your help.
Everyone's being put to work stripping and repainting furniture.  Too much
plaid. It's very distressing."

"They *painted* on plaid?" Celeste asked.

Tser nodded again, and narrowed her eyes.  "Yes.  They reupholstered
anything that could be reupholstered, as well.  Insidious isn't it?  It
must've taken them forever to do the painting of all those --" she
shuddered, "-- clashing stripes."

"Maybe they used a stencil," Cousine Celeste suggested.

"Could be," the exhausted leader said, and smiled kindly at Nick.  "I hope
you're having a good time here," she said, sounding sincere.  "Have fun!"
She wandered off, the can of paint thinner swinging at her side.

"Uh, wait, I could help," Nick said.  It sounded safe, relatively speaking.
Repetetive busywork.

"Oh, no," Tser said.  "You're a guest here.  We wouldn't ask LaCroix to
help, of course we wouldn't ask you.  Thank you anyway." This time her
stride away was purposeful and her mind was churning.  Why had he asked to
help?  Was this prank pulled by the Knighties, and he was experiencing
guilt, angst about it?  He may have let them into CERK and helped coordinate
the attack.

"Next up, the basement!" Celeste declared, guiding Nick towards the lobby
again.

This time she led him not to the elevator, but to a large oaken door,
strangely out of place, near the lobby.  A surreptitious glance towards the
desk revealed to Nick that Jess was missing, and he allowed himself a brief
moment of relief.  Until Celeste opened the heavy door and revealed the
massive stone-block steps leading into the darkness.

"I thought this was an office building," Nick said uncomfortably.

"It is!" Celeste said, and started down the steps.  "LaCroix has had all
sorts of mods done to it."

[LaCroix did this,] Nick thought.  [Who knows what evil lurks down there.]

"Coming?" Celeste asked.

The LaCroix-clad vampire cop surpressed his misgiving and began to follow
her.

He found himself in a large, cool stone room.  It was lit with dripping
natural beeswax candles set in sconces, but the air was circulated through
modern means.  He looked around, noting a series of huge doors with bars set
in them.  "What is this place?" he asked.

"Our dungeon," Celeste said matter-of-factly.

"Your *what*?  Dungeon?  Why on earth do you have a dungeon?" Nick
exclaimed.  This truly was a sign of the Cousins' derangement.  They no
doubt kept prisoners to torture and torment in these small stone cells.

"Oh, you know," Celeste said, and nodded as if sharing a secret.  "Come this
way, I'll show you all the cool stuff the GSS left behind.  They're not
really an active force anymore, but they left all sorts of neat gadgets."

The GSS' headquarters looked a bit more like the standard basement.  But it
was disorderly and filled with strange looking electronics, bizarre weapons
on the walls, a clear fridge filled with different colored chemicals and
biological samples, and various insidious looking equipement.

"Keen, isn't it?" Celeste asked, grinning.  This time the smile was
decidedly evil.

But Nick was gone.

Horrified, he took the steps swiftly.  Torture devices... he'd distinctly
seen equipment designed for torture -- some of it not so high-tech.  And
what was that floating in the jar in the freezer?  For some reason, he felt
distinctly angry.  He shook his head to clear it.  Yes, they were evil, but
they were still human, not food.  He needed to control the beast within.  He
realized, belatedly, that he hadn't eaten the entire day, and who knew when
LaCroix had eaten before that.

He burst into the lobby, and three startled Cousins turned to look at him.

"Is there a problem?" Tok asked slowly.  Rhonda and Brandi edged a little
behind Tok.

"Actually," Nick said, straightening and trying to calm himself down from
the horrors he'd witnessed, "I'm hungry."

"Brandi will get you some blood from LaCroix's private stock," Tok said.
She nodded to Brandi who scurried off to retrieve the liquid.

"I don't drink human blood," Nick pointed out.

"You do while you're in LaCroix's body," Tok said firmly.  "You'll put
nothing substandard in it."  [Well, the Happy Souvlaki Deli is definitely
not substandard, even if the fare didn't exactly agree with him,] she
rationalized.

Nick wasn't in the mood to argue -- in fact, he was a little frightened to.
He nodded and waited for Brandi to return.  She did, carrying two green wine
bottles.  With Jess walking beside her.

"I'll take these to LaCroix's penthouse," he muttered upon spotting them.
He grabbed the bottles, mumbled a thanks, and zipped into the elevator.

"What's wrong with him?" Rhonda asked.  "He's even weirder than Vachon was!"

"I dunno!" Jess said.  "Maybe he saw a post-it note."

# # #

--
Cousin Tserisa & the Cousinly Critters
- headpigeons@hotmail.com -
Cousin, Ratpacker 8:>X and CaddyWhack
FK Stuff: http://geocities.com/tserisa/
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