The Hunter

At the Centre of the Maze

Gloria was still confused about what they were hunting. A succubus was female, an incubus was male, she felt that she had lost something somewhere. She followed Finn through two alley's and across an empty road before they saw any warehouses.

Low buildings that ranged in condition from obviously upkept to condemned and still used by the homeless population. Nothing was free from the taggers' graffitti and so Gloria couldn't even tell what road they were on.

Finn seemed to choose a warehouse at random, and Gloria made a mental note to ask her about that later. Was there some sort of radar that the Hunter had? Did Gloria just miss a sign?

The warehouse she chose was boarded up but unlike the rest of the boarded up warehouses she could see, this one seemed like the boards were still attached to the building. Only the one by the door was propped up, and Finn pushed it down with apparent disregard for the noise it would make.

Gloria winced at the crash and looked over her shoulder, expecting at any moment for someone to come around the corner. A police officer. A security guard. After a moment she turned back to follow Finn into the building, a little disappointed that not even the wind had come around the corner.

Inside the door more boards had been haphazardly erected into a maze of hallways. Finn tapped one and glanced at Gloria.

"I'm tempted to ask you to just light this place up. It's a fire hazard regardless, but if she has any humans in here I don't know that I'd be able to get them out. If I knock them down we're in the same situation where this place is a fire trap and they'd be stuck inside." Finn sighed and pulled a thick tube from one of the pockets of her bag. "I guess that means we do the maze."

Gloria blinked when Finn made a green mark on the wood wall at their first turn before taking the right option. It was some sort of grease paint and not what Gloria expected to be in a witches' tool belt.

Another mental note: what exactly does go into a witches' tool belt? Do they have tool belts? What colour would they be? Did she need one?

Gloria shook her head to focus and found she had misplaced Finn. The next turn had a similar mark Finn had made on the last turn and so Gloria turned right again. At the next turn there was no marking, but from what she could see there was a lot of marks to the right. Hearts and fire and pretty blues.

Gloria stepped towards the graffiti and smiled at the sheer beauty of it. Around the corner there was a room made of all the most plush fabrics, candles flickered gently and there was a small fountain beside a reclining seat. Finn was kneeling on the seat, using it to balance while she choked the life out of an innocent, beautiful woman.

Gloria calmly pulled the flames from the candle and lit Finn on fire. The murderous woman screamed in pain and dropped to the ground, rolling to put the fires out. Gloria held them burning and was not surprised when the horrid woman turned to face her. A flash of something metallic and Gloria found herself back in the armoury.

Her jaw would have actually dropped open if not for the gag in her mouth and she spun to the door to get to a phone. As she ran her memory cleared: bloody rags and shredded bodies, not plush fabric. A single fire barrel, no candles. The fountain was a drip from the ceiling and considering the colour Gloria was now realizing it was she was glad she hadn't looked up.

Finn had been choking the woman, but she had been bloody too and her shirt had been hanging in tatters. The maze hadn't even been there at all. After they gained entrance to the warehouse all of Gloria's memories were wrong and being corrected with an overlay of what had actually happened.

Gloria ripped the gag from her mouth and started dialing, not even sure who she was trying to reach or what numbers she was tapping.

"Crimson and Clover's where we'll do you over and over." The voice on the other end was oozing femininity and Gloria nearly hung up. Gritting her teeth she chose to hope for the best instead.

"I need to talk to Crimson or Clover." Gloria demanded.

"Oh darling, don't we all? And of course it's never just a talk." Unbidden and image of the receptionist and what she'd been wearing, or not wearing in Gloria's opinion, moved into the front of her mind.

"Finn's in trouble. She was looking for a rogue succubus. We were just there! I walked right past you, I had a gag in my mouth!" Gloria found herself screeching and she gulped air to try and calm down. There was a pause on the other end of the phone.

"You walked out with a gag?" The voice had lost some of it's sexy cadence.

"Yes. Finn was leading the way. She was in combat gear. Sort of."

"So you are admitting you are in possession of stolen property?" The voice was hard now and Gloria blinked in shock.

"What?"

"Please hold." Gloria stared at the phone, utterly dumbfounded, and was about to hang up and try someone out of the book she'd made more notes in when a somewhat familiar voice came on the line.

"Gloria I believe your name was? Why are you calling us, why aren't you with Finn?"

"Crimson?" Gloria asked, her voice thin with frustration and fear.

"Clover. Explain."

Gloria did, speeding up as she went and trying to give the details of how her memory was changing without taking too long. When she was done she could feel the silence coming over the line. Finally, Clover seemed to make up her mind.

"How are you with dogs?"

"What?"

"Dogs. Big ones."

"I'm fine. I had a German Shepard before I left home." Gloria answered curiously.

"Ok. Come back here. We can't go help Finn, but you can take the dog." Clover said into the phone. Gloria could hear Crimson saying something in the background, but she figured she could ask questions when she got there and she hung up the phone. The front door swung open before she even touched it and she worried what that would mean for Finn.