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[in-a-handbasket.insanejournal.com]

WHO: Hel & Jersey Devil
WHEN: Late Saturday night
WHERE: Some dark alley
WHAT: Two of the darker denizens of the city and an unplanned encounter
WARNINGS: tba? Probably actually not too much.

There were storms coming in and the temperature had dropped dramatically over the last few hours. Not that this bothered Hel: anything was warmer than Helheim, that frozen over wasteland she'd once ruled by force. Anything on the surface was better than that. Hel didn't even mind that she wasn't a queen anymore. Queen had never been a title she'd cared for, although she considered herself to be a fair queen. She didn't feel sympathy for the dead. She commanded and ruled and let the rules be black and white. She had not been merciful, no more than she had been cruel. She simply did as was her appointed job.

But up here her only job was a human one, where she determined the reason for death by exploring mortal corpses. A fascinating change in jobs, but still related to the dead.

The night streets offered no danger to Hel and from the darkness of an alley she watched young men and women pass by on their way home, or out to clubs or... to wherever humans went. They were still a little mysterious to her.

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[newjersey-devil.insanejournal.com]

Lucas loved when it stormed in the city. The lightning cracked across the sky, and he could feel the thunder in his bones. The shift in the weather tended to force most people inside, but there were still a few left walking the streets. And he was hungry.

He found a young woman walking alone, and it wasn't any trouble to subdue her and drag her into an alley, his teeth buried in her neck. He hardly even notice the other presence, he just needed to feed.

[in-a-handbasket.insanejournal.com]

From her shadowed spot against the wall, Hel watched, silent and still, as this man-shaped creature ate. She was no stranger to beasts that wore human faces - her own brothers and nephews were the only companions she chose and there was nothing human about any of them, despite appearances. She was the most human of them all, and right now, with her dead half glamoured to match the living flesh, she looked like nothing more than that to anyone who saw her.

After some time simply watching, Hel spoke. "Interesting."

[newjersey-devil.insanejournal.com]

Lucas looked up when she spoke, licking blood from his fingers. She hadn't run screaming from the alley, so more than likely, she was something like him. He let what was left of the girl fall to the floor of the alley, leaning back against the wall. He was sated for now.

"Do tell what's interesting," he said, in a conversational tone.

[in-a-handbasket.insanejournal.com]

"You're young," Hel said, still unmoved from her own spot. Only her eyes shifted to take him in. "But vicious. Is this what you really look like?"

[newjersey-devil.insanejournal.com]

"In comparison to you?" Lucas asked. "And maybe, but it's eat or be eaten. Literally, in my case."

Her question made him snort. "My real form tends to inspire mass panic. Wings, hooves, claws, the whole nine yards."

[in-a-handbasket.insanejournal.com]

"In comparison to me," Hel agreed simply. Then she dropped the guise she wore - one moment she was a beautiful well formed woman and in the blink of an eye half of her was nothing but rotting flesh on one side, maggots crawling their way through decaying and bloated flesh, and tatters of clothes.

"Mass panic is common among the humans."

[newjersey-devil.insanejournal.com]

Lucas raised one eyebrow. "Half living, half dead," he remarked, for all the world like this was perfectly normal. "Now there's something you don't see every day."

"And don't I know it," he agreed. "Their feathers get ruffled with the slightest breeze."

[in-a-handbasket.insanejournal.com]

"Then perhaps I am the only one of this kind," Hel said. "Humans are probably 'ruffled' because you eat them."

[newjersey-devil.insanejournal.com]

"Maybe," Lucas said, shrugging. "Hey, they have only themselves to blame for that. For over a hundred years, I stole cattle from fields and did just fine. But then they started telling stories about me carrying off people. And Hollywood picked up on the idea, made a bunch of terrible movies. They make their own worst nightmares themselves. And me?" He shrugged again. "I'm riding the wave."

[in-a-handbasket.insanejournal.com]

"Interesting," Hel said again. "Humanity's fear of that which lurks in the darkness is constantly intriguing. They keep making monsters for themselves. Even if they understood their power, I'm not sure they'd stop."

[newjersey-devil.insanejournal.com]

Lucas just shook his head. "Sometimes, I think they like being afraid," he theorized. "They like the idea of the safe, horror movie fear that ends after two hours. They just never imagined that the movie would come to life and take a bite out of them."

[in-a-handbasket.insanejournal.com]

"Fortunate for creatures like you," Hel said. "I don't understand the appeal of fear. I don't feel it."

[newjersey-devil.insanejournal.com]

"Pretty much, yeah," Lucas agreed. "And neither do I, not really. But some people or beings really love it, I guess."

[in-a-handbasket.insanejournal.com]

"Do you wear a name like you wear a skin?" Hel asked him. "What kind of thing are you: a god-being or simply one of a species. I've met others that eat humans, but they weren't like you."