Boy staggered drunk as always as he crossed the Ouse Bridge. His name was something of a severe misnomer. He was anything but a boy...

He’d lived on the streets since his alcoholism cost him his job. The name was more of a joke thanks to the large carrier he carried all of his earthly possessions in. The flash of white plastic was criss-crossed with the navy blue and red plumage declaring it the property of the Boyes’ discount store. He looked pensive as he ran his slur-swollen tongue over his bottom lip, leaving a faint trail of cheap liquor as he watched the figure standing on a narrow sandbank near the site of a soon to be demolished building that overlooked the river.

He rubbed his eyes and thought of yelling before the feeling of warmth creeping from his crotch to his knees stopped him. As assuredly it would seem, as the fear that stemmed up from the figure as it stepped over the faintly frothing threshold into the sensually lapping current of the Ouse. As Boy watched, growing ever more uneasy, the figure seemed to stop by the water’s edge, it’s head raised as though sniffing the air.

He squinted. Was the figure naked? He rubbed his eyes a second time and felt his chest tighten as the seemingly-naked figure stared directly at him. Twin pools of yellow light where it’s eyes should have been, flaring slightly before it returned it’s attentions to the water.

--------------------

Porter was bored.

He’d been in York for several weeks now and it showed.

He admitted to himself that the city was beautiful. The architecture appealed even to a 900 year old Feral. It reminded him of his various sojourns in Medieval Edinburgh. In fact, much of York’s “old streets” mirrored those of Edinburgh’s [i:7ef5f94453]“Royal Mile”[/i:7ef5f94453].

He hadn’t conversed much with Kathy. He’d tailed her movements a few times in his avian form, but she seemed quite capable...for a [i:7ef5f94453]Dilettante[/i:7ef5f94453]. He’d amused himself since his arrival in the city by frightening tourists undertaking the numerous [i:7ef5f94453]“Ghost tours”[/i:7ef5f94453]. The Masquerade protected by their belief that his monstrous visage was a mask.

He looked into the river, sensing dozens of sleeping minds along it’s banks. Geese and ducks slumbering in the protective brush. A cloying scent caught his nostrils raising his gaze from the river.

On the ancient bridge a human was watching him. Judging by the sway of his movements and the reek that clouded around him, he was a drunk human.

Porter sighed as the human shouted drunkenly, trying to draw attention from passers-by.

[i:7ef5f94453]“A monster! A monster in the river! It looks like a man!”[/i:7ef5f94453]

He muttered a few silent curses as the cries for attention intensified. Reaching upwards with his mind he locked thoughts with the idiotic Kine and sent a simple instruction to his “Reptilian brain”.

Panic flooded through Boy’s heart sending him running blindly into the road.

The bus couldn’t have stopped in time even if it’d tried.

All the passengers heard was a sickening crunch as the vagrant was crushed under their vessel’s wheels.

Porter, again free to do as he pleased, walked forward into the river and swam upstream. Never raising to draw breath...one of the advantages of being Kindred.