What the cat dragged in.

5 What at happens in Vagus.

Creed fucking hated traveling by air. He didn't like being confined in general, but he especially hated being confined in a tiny, noisy space with a shitload of other people with no way out and no privacy to kill any of them. If this had been a regular job where time didn't matter so much, he would have driven.

The stewardess appeared at his side. "Can I take your coat, Mr. Sanders?"

He glared until she walked away. Even though he was sitting in first class, the seats were still to fucking narrow for his shoulders and too close together. At least there was a good chance this part of the plane wouldn't be packed. He pulled out the book he'd brought along and tried to look like he was absorbed in it. All he succeeded in doing was getting lost in the traces of the frail's scent that still lingered on his coat.

No matter how often or how well it was cleaned, traces of every job he'd ever done clung to the coat. Sweat, shit, blood, piss, brains and everything else a human body could produce, before during and after death had found its way into the fabric at one time or another. It was a subtle miasma that didn't exist in the consciousness of most of the rest of the world, but it reminded him of what he was. Victor Creed, the animal who lived on rage and bloodlust. The heartless bastard who would kill anyone for the right price. The creature who fucking liked the feeling of warm blood splashing his face. The nightmare who could torture the strongest men into insanity. The asshole who left nothing but corpses and grieving in his wake.

He didn't regret a single one of those scents. He was all of those things and more that words hadn't been invented for yet. Her sweet scent mixed with the base notes of gore and terror reminded him that he was something else too. At least for the moment, he was a protector again. Not because someone had paid him to be, but because he had chosen to be. Probably wouldn't last. Probably end up with her fucking blood on the coat. Right now it didn't matter.

He closed his eyes and remembered how she felt curled up against him. She was still too fucking skinny, but the angles of her bones were starting to soften now. Her small hand had rested on his chest, her slim fingers splayed over his heart. Her head had been resting on his shoulder, her sweet scent overlaid with anxiety and healing wounds. Wounds that he'd given her, that she'd practically begged for.

Creed got another rush of power from the memory.

A high pitched giggle shattered the fragile thought. The stench of expensive perfume on a cheap whore assaulted him next. He opened his eyes and watched a man in his sixties lead a girl in her twenties down the aisle, his hand on the small of her back. The scent of two different men wafted off of her as she passed by. They sat two rows ahead of him on the other side of the aisle, with her on the outside.

The incessant chatter was annoying as hell, but he tuned it out. He still had last minute plans to settle his mind to, and he let the collage of scents inspire him.

*~*~*~*~*~*

Kelly couldn't say that she was scared exactly. She didn't like being alone, and she wasn't exactly sure how she was going to pass two whole days by herself, but she trusted that Victor wouldn't have left if she were in immediate danger. Why she trusted him at all wasn't clear to her. If anyone else had covered her in bruises and bites and scratches, she wouldn't have been sitting there missing him. She would have fought as hard and as long as she could, and then run as soon as he left her alone for ten minutes.

It wasn't that she doubted he was dangerous either. Kelly knew without doubt that he was verydangerous and that he would make good on every one of the threats he'd made, if she gave him reason. There was more to him than that though, whether he wanted her to see it or not. He made her smile, both with his sarcasm and the way he could turn a veiled threat into something approximating an endearment. He didn't ask a thousand questions about Stan or what he'd done to her. She got the impression that he had a pretty good idea already. If she'd had to guess, she would say he'd been through worse.