but oh what a year

[patrols]

Comments

[patrols]

Okay. You have incoming. Damon reached out to one of the workers at the Armory and while Damon didn't know what a Slayer was, they sure did. She wants to see if we have anything on a guy named Arcadius.

[She can't come out there to help him but maybe Liv will be able to help with Dorian.]

Calls himself the Devil, theoretically made his own hell dimension with the power of his mind. Her name is Liv, I don't know what she is beyond her working for the Armory.

[telegraphs]

I'll have to check my books.

( He heaves Dorian over onto the back of his truck bed with a thunk. )

And beyond her knowing what a slayer's about. And, guessing, a watcher. Liv. Right. Should I stay put then. Do you know if she's a strong lass?

[patrols]

Will Dorian be okay if you stay put?

[It sounds like he needs a hospital.]

I could tell her to meet you at the hospital.

[telegraphs]

He's concussed, but walking. Whatever the vampire did, it wasn't anything fatal. 'You ask me, it reads like just desserts but nothing past. Wouldn't be a wrong idea to get him checked out. You can send Liv to the hospital.

( He rolls Dorian over a smidge so he can close the black of his truck bed. )

Ah'm fifteen out.

[patrols]

Okay, I'll let her know. Be careful.

[She doesn't know what he's walking into.

She will, however, head back to Damon and get him to send Liv the information, and Liv will stroll into the emergency room, scanning around for the librarian and making her way over.

"Liv Parker. How's Dorian?"]

[telegraphs]

( He's in his best brown suit, standing, scrolling through his digitized archives before he looks up. )

He's being looked at. May just have a concussion. Beck Ford. So, you're Armory.

[geminated]

And you're a Watcher. You know, I thought the Slayers were something these old guys made up because they couldn't handle lady hunters, but I guess I was wrong.

[She takes a deep breath.]

I really hope you have something, because we've been beating our head against a wall and Cade needs to go.

[telegraphs]

A Slayer is something the old guys made up. They made the first slayer. But, we are not ran the same, not like they did.

( Technically. He says this in close proximity, though, so there are no prying ears. )

I was just looking at everything I digitized, but we'll have to get back to my books to be sure. Do you have to be anywhere?

[geminated]

[She shakes her head.]

Nope. Dorian's found, and that was the only other job I had today.

[So she's good to go wherever you want her to.]

Where are we heading?

[telegraphs]

Oh, Dorian's one of yours. Sorry for the state he's in.

( Not that it's his fault. )

You ever sit foot inside the Mystic Falls library?

[geminated]

Not your fault.

[Dorian brought it on himself and she has a feeling Stefan had a thing or two to do with this too.]

I have, though it's been a minute. Armory's got a library of it's own.

[telegraphs]

Well, there are all the classics, along with my own personal collection.

( Also his collection on loan. )

[geminated]

Well, I'm hoping your personal collection will have more about Arcadius than we do.

[Liv's really starting to get frustrated.]

He's a big problem that really needs to be solved.

[telegraphs]

What happened to Dorian, that related?

( Give him a little more information, and then, fine. )

[geminated]

Tangentially?

[Liv isn't sure how much drama to spill but she can spare the Cade relevant parts.]

Cade took control of two of the more powerful vampires in town, brothers. Had them flip their humanity switches and have been terrorizing the town for a while. One of them, Stefan, killed the wrong person, got himself vervained, and we had him locked up in the Armory for a while. But Dorian, for personal reasons, decided to break him out so he could kill Stefan himself and ... as you can see, that didn't really go well for him.

[telegraphs]

No, it did not. Well. I see everyone runs hot-headed in this town. Almost reminds me of home. Alaric is Dorian's emergency contact if you're good to get packing.

( Let's find a solution! )

[geminated]

Let's go.

[And they'll head out to the library. Liv has a lot of more general questions, but she can be kept on task when the problem calls for it. So once they hit the books, she'll fill in some more information that might help.]

So what we know about Cade is that he was a powerful psychic when he was alive, but his community turned on him and burned him at the stake, and in his moment of death he created his own pocket Hell.

[telegraphs]

( He pulls what hopefully is relevant, but because he's unfamiliar with all things Arcadius and hell is a broad topic, he does his best (13) )

Sizzling. ( He peruses one book, line by line, but listens. ) And he enslaved Stefan and Damon Salvatore, yeah?

( He can connect dots, too. )

[geminated]

Before that he had sirens. Also sisters. The Armory had been keeping them in a special vault but they got let out. They're dead now though. The Salvatores were Cade's new favorite toys.

[Until they managed to get through to Damon and theoretically Stefan is himself again but who knows what that means.]

His whole goal is to get more souls for his hell dimension, whatever that takes.

[telegraphs]

There's always something else. Sirens. Greek in origin, but there are traces of them across several cultures. Wonder how a "Devil" comes to target two vampires in Mystic Falls. Perhaps, the Armory? It was the sirens' choice?

( He tilts his head. )

Who did Stefan take off the table?

[geminated]

I think the sirens were the ones doing the choosing. They were looking for someone to take their place so they could be free of Cade. I don't know what the deal was that the Salvatores made, but it's been pretty brutal.

[She pauses at the question though.]

I mean, he's killed a lot of people recently, so you may have to narrow that thought down.

[telegraphs]

You said he offed some poor sap before he was vervained. Proves the poor sap is probably significant to the story? Helps to have all the facts.

( His last kill before being jailed. )

[geminated]

He didn't get to her. He got to one of the people protecting her.

[She exhales slowly as she tries to figure out how best to explain it.]

This friend of ours, Elena, she's under a Sleeping Beauty curse. She's human, but she also has the cure for vampirism in her system. My partner and I have been protecting her, but our friend asked us for access to her, because she wanted access to the cure. Around the same time, Cade offered both Stefan and Damon a deal - kill a hundred people or kill Elena. Stefan took option B.

[She swallows hard.]

Elena's okay, and so is our friend, but their boyfriend is not. He was a vampire and he wasn't invited in.

[And it sucks. Both for Bonnie and for Liv. It was nice having another outsider to commiserate with when the Mystic Falls clique got to be a little too much.]

[telegraphs]

Those are nasty. ( But, right. Listening. ) Significant, then. And another soul for Cade. Doesn't sound evil, either, so, much as the lore is saying 'worst of the worst,' it sounds like Cade is getting less discerning. Hard to find a hundred criminals in a short amount of time.

[geminated]

I don't think it was ever about people being evil. I think it was always about revenge.

[And Liv understands that, really.]

Spend your whole life caring for a community, only to have them turn on you in an instant? I would assume that everyone deserves Hell too.