Night's Omen

Wesley thought back to how he'd come to be standing before the lovely Delilah. It had all started with a phonecall - or lack thereof. While he himself thrived on punctuality, he knew that Drew wasn't a master of the clock all the time. However, Drew had always called when running late, and he'd never just flat out vanished, which, as Wes was finding out, was definitely the case. His eyes were more gold than he'd like for them to be at the moment as he and Delilah, whose name he'd learned was Aimee, exchanged a worried glance.

She had turned her head and quietly whispered something to the smaller girl who was currently bawling her eyes out. Wesley knew that she was Melisande, and he was suddenly very aware of how severe the situation was becoming. The story he'd gotten was that she'd not been able to get ahold of him either - she'd assumed she was dumped, and she'd been upset about that, but when Joshua and Wesley showed up to see if she'd seen him...

"Delilah, may I speak with you for a moment?" he asked. He wasn't going to call her Aimee, even in the office where Eden had let them talk, because this was still her work establishment. He cared about his friends, but he wasn't going to make waves, regardless of how incredibly pissed off and afraid he was.

He nodded to Josh, who handed Melisande a bottle of water and rubbed her back lightly. Wesley held the door open for the brunette and walked alongside her to the side exit, and then leaned against the wall, looking at her for a long moment. The scent of leopard was filling his nostrils, so much that he wanted to just rub his cheek against hers to comfort himself. He pushed his inner lion back down for the time being, though, because obviously there was more important shit going on.

"Mel says she hasn't talked to Drew or seen him, and while I didn't know what to expect, when I rolled up and saw her crying her eyes out, I am fully ready to believe her. Now, SWAT members don't just disappear. Is she connected to... to Midnight at all?" He hated to ask, absolutely positively hated to, but... people vanishing into thin air? That was a little too familiar.

"Aimee, if you can think of anything - please, tell me. The city is about to release the dogs on this one so to speak, but I'm trying to handle it myself before we turn up a cold body." His voice was soft, but low and dangerous. He was afraid, and it showed.

This was highly irregular, even for a person who had a fairly irregular job and life pattern like Aimee did.  You didn't have SWAT officers showing up on 'unofficial' business asking about a situation involving your friend's new boyfriend being missing very often, and finding out that Melisande's little human boyfriend was friends with a LION was even more surprising.  Who would have thought?

Unfortunately, that made this whole situation that much stranger.  Drew probably didn't know about his friend's little 'uniqueness' anymore than he knew that Aimee was a leopard, and that left him open for attacks from other things he didn't know about.  It was such a tough call, deciding whether it was better to tell humans about the world behind the 'veil' of normalcy they saw, or leaving them ignorant of it.  Some people drew less attention if they didn't know, and others were left completely open for horrors they wouldn't ever even know to protect themselves against.  Aimee was worried that Drew might have become one of the latter.

That was NOT good.

Actually, she wasn't so sure that leaving Melisande with Josh was good, either, but the man had a good way about him, and really?  If Josh and Wes had meant them any harm, Melisande couldn't have held Josh off, and Aimee couldn't have held off a lion.  She'd have tried just because she had to, but she couldn't have done it, and she knew it.  Especially, a male lion.  Fortunately, she got more of a 'cuddle pile' vibe out of him than anything threatening, which she found interesting.  That didn't usually happen to her, though she'd grant it to him that she didn't spend a lot of time around other felines, other than Nikki and Drake, who were also friends.  This was the first time she'd met Wes.  So far, she liked him, but she wished it would have been under other circumstances that they'd met. 

So, she thought of Nero, and how nice it'd be to cuddle him for dealing with this situation, and it was just a little easier when Wes 'suggested' that he might not have believed Melisande without the tears.  "Of course you should believe her.  She's not going to lie about it, and no, she's not connected to Midnight!  She really liked, likes Drew, and she was really upset when we thought he'd dumped her.  What else were we supposed to think?" 

If she could think of anything.  Damn, what was there TO think?  "Honestly, I really don't know what happened to your friend, but I wish he did.  I just know that he never got as far as All Hallows that night.  Wasn't that the plan?  He was going to come here?  Melisande said something about you guys coming over," she pointed out, figuring that working backwards was the best way to do things.  Of course, the SWAT boys would know that better than her, but this wasn't her usual thing.  She was trying from a scientific point.  "I think that working our way backwards, hitting the places he should have been, would be the best idea to figure out where he could have vanished from, if it's at all possible.  He's really not the sort to just impulsively run off to do something like this?"

FAIL. He hadn't meant to imply that Melisande was connected directly. He facepalmed and leaned against the wall, trying to clear his head. "Not how I meant it," he said flinching. "I meant to ask if there wasn't anyone who'd had their eye on her - someone you'd seen or noticed? That girl knew what I was the moment I walked through the door. You don't just know things like that without attracting some attention." He folded his arms and sighed, lowering his voice and taking the harsh sound. "I'm sorry, miss. I just... this is beyond my comprehension right now."

He wanted to punch the wall, but he didn't think it'd really do any good, and letting his beast walk a little closer to the edge wouldn't do anything except accelerate the situation to a further level of not good. "Yeah, this was the end point. He was excited about us hanging out, said Melisande had some nice friends, that the place was pretty decent, even if it was - y'know, a strip club. But after a full two days, we haven't heard shit. I damn near broke down his girlfriend's door, only to find out that she was flipping out as bad as we were."

He closed his eyes. "I've been over and over in my head a thousand times, but the only way to do this is to get Silvera on something else and to sniff him out myself. He was on the phone with Josh when he got... grabbed, or whatever the hell it was. Josh said he was walkin' through Central Park, so that's where I'm going to start."

"If it's all the same, I think it'd be better if someone kept an eye on Melisande. I don't know where Drew is or what happened, but I know he would want that girl watched over like a hawk if there was any sign of foul play, which at this point, all signs point to. I'm going to have Silvera round her up and get her things. I know this is going to sound really forward, but can you stay with her? Is there someone else who can? Someone... not human?"

Wesley hated to admit how frail his best friends were, but when it boiled down to it, he'd put Aimee on detail over Mel before he would Silvera, simply because Aimee would be able to handle getting thrown through a wall. Josh would probably suffer massive internal bleeding and die. It didn't work out for Wes in his head.

Oh.  Oh, no no no.

"Mr. Bishop, if we had any inkling that someone Midnight-related may have taken an interest in Melisande, she wouldn't have been permitted anywhere near your friend, just to be safe.  She is the only human who works here, and we all keep that fact in mind where her safety is concerned.  Honestly, I worry about whatever it is that lets her pick out vampires and shifters so easily, but we've kept an eye on her," the leopard explained, and she meant it.  That was why Nikki, Marius and Drake walked her home, and why the dancers were all so in her face, besides the fact that they just liked being around her.  They liked her, she was one of the 'family', and they weren't letting anything happen to her.  She was fragile in the grand scheme of things, and Aimee personally never wanted to see her hurt.

If she'd known that Drew was potentially going to get into this mess, she'd have discouraged the whole encounter with him just to avoid the potential for trouble in Melisande's life.  Too late now.

"Believe me, we'll be watching out for her.  I may have her stay the night at my place, if I can talk her into it, or I'll be forcing Nikki or Marius to camp on her couch.  It's not like they have to sleep, or that they have anything better to do."  They'd manage entertaining themselves, of that she was sure.  From what she'd heard, they could both use some practice with the Mario Kart and Super Smash Brothers, because Melisande was always talking about beating their asses at it.  "We'll take care of her, I promise, so don't worry yourself about that.  It's your friend that we need to worry about, so what do you plan on doing about him?  I doubt Josh is going to want to hang out on the sidelines, and if it is something Midnight or vampire related, he's going to have to know eventually, don't you think?  Or do you never plan on telling him?"

She wasn't so sure, for reasons previously stated, if that was the best idea.  Josh might be better knowing, given the seriousness of the situation.  "You said he was on the phone with Josh when he vanished.  Has anyone found the phone, or his car?"  Didn't cell phones have some sort of GPS in them?

He frowned as she asked him if he'd been planning on keeping Joshua in the dark forever. "I wasn't, actually," he snapped, letting her know she'd struck a chord. He had to deal with the daily debate of telling his two closest companions that he was different, nevermind how he still couldn't figure out how to breach the subject with his little brother. He wanted to bang his face into the wall now instead of his fist, and sighed, trying to find something to do with his energy otherwise. He began to pace, like a caged animal, which wasn't too far from the truth.

He opened his mouth to speak again when the sound of a voice at the back door startled him. He turned and half-stepped to Aimee's side, just a slight amount in front of her. He could feel the hair on the back of his neck stand up, and realized that his paranoia was just about tangible at this point. He was relieved to see Josh and Melisande coming out of the door, and unfolded his arms, relaxing visibly as his shoulders lowered themselves a little.

Josh gave him a questioning glance, and then looked at Aimee. He realized he'd probably still call her Delilah, and sort of shook the thought off as he folded his own arms. "James just buzzed me in. He says that they definitely managed to find the signal on Drew's phone, and it's somewhere in the Central Park area, which makes sense, since that's where he said he was when I talked to him last. I'm guessing we get Mel home, and head that way. Your brother is a resourceful shit when he wants to be," he added.

"Uh, I'm not going home," Melisande piped in weakly. She looked at Aimee, blinking rapidly as both men stared at her. She glanced to Josh, and then to Wes, and said, firmly again, "I'm not going home. Drew's my...  I'm coming with you guys. I don't care if this is official business or not. I'm going."

Wesley glanced at Aimee again. If Melisande always seemed to know what people were, then he wondered how good at tracking she was. Could she 'feel' Drew through the din of the city? He looked at Melisande, and nodded. "Okay, fine. You come with us. You stay by my side, though. No questions." He ignored a curious glance from Josh, who no doubt suddenly wondered why Wesley was all chest-puffed about Melisande, but then again, he wouldn't question him. Wes was a big guy.

Well, this was going well.  Aimee actually wilted a little, feeling bad for getting him more upset.  Obviously, he was worried about his friend, and it didn't seem like much she was saying was doing anything other than make things worse.  Fortunately, she was saved from putting her foot in her mouth again, if that could even be described as what she'd done, since she hadn't really said anything WRONG, when Josh and Melisande joined them in the hallway.

Personally, she'd have preferred leaving Melisande with their two vamp boys at the bar than take her with, but she supposed that a lion AND a leopard could keep the girl safe.  It wasn't like Josh would be useless, either.

She hoped that's all that would matter, anyway.  They really didn't know what to expect.

"You just stay out of the way if something happens, okay?  We'll take care of things," Aimee added as they essentially decided that they were all going.  This was like the set-up for a bad Final Fantasy, the party being formed.  Hopefully, Melisande wouldn't end up as a sort of Rinoa character that got kidnapped every five seconds.  Aimee might spaz, and Wes looked like he'd destroy something. 

Wesley looked at Aimee, almost as though he knew what she was thinking. He looked back to Melisande, and then to Josh, and nodded his head. "Let's go, then." He'd noticed Mel had changed back into her normal clothing - jeans, shoes, and a tank top. He couldn't say he completely approved, but then again, he felt like the only way to keep this one safe was to load her up in battle armour. Where was an Abrams when you needed one?

He watched Josh as the man produced an extra magazine for his gun from out of thin air, and then dropped it into the back pocket of his pants. The gun, he knew, was tucked in his belt, covered by the back of his t-shirt. Wesley took a shaky breath as he moved to let Aimee and Melisande pass in front of him, trying to steady himself. He told himself firmly that they would find Drew, even if it meant exposing himself. He didn't have a choice at that point in time.

About halfway to Central Park, however, Melisande stopped dead in her tracks. Wesley nearly barreled over her - she'd been doing a good job of staying directly next to or in front of him at all times, and he was glad for it. This stopping shit wasn't going to work, though.

"Hey, c'mon. You wanted to come - we need to keep moving," he said gently, reaching out for her shoulder. He looked up at Aimee, desperate for some sort of... calm, rational voice, because he was about to lose his.

"No, I -- " she trailed off. She closed her mouth, shrugging into the light grey hoodie she wore, and glanced around. "It's like... It's like we're going the wrong way. Like he's here, somewhere, and we already passed him." Her lower lip quivered a little, but Melisande wasn't one to discount her own instincts. "Can we run this way, really quick? I mean, if you don't want to, you can keep going, I can go do it on my own. It will only take a second."

Her eyes slid to the right, and it was pretty apparent that she was going to go whether she got the green light or not. She looked back at Aimee, wondering how to try and explain that sometimes she just knew things. Would Aimee back her up?

"Hey, why we stopped?" Josh asked, turning around. "I got James on the horn again, he's put a few cruisers out in the area to patrol. Mel, if he's up walkin' around, they're gonna see him," he said firmly. "I mean, shit. It ain't like he's just chillin' out in the alley by his apartment. That would be nice, but this is reality."

"Uh, I'm sure you meant that a lot less asshole-ish than it sounded, Silvera," Wes said, holding a hand up to him with a flat tone to his voice. He got a returned shrug from his teammate, who turned on a heel to keep moving. He could hear him muttering something about 'sandbox' and 'goddamn stupid ass city', but he couldn't really make it all out.

He turned back to say something to Melisande, but all he saw was her figure headed down the street at top speed. "Oh, Christ," he growled, his voice deepening more than was necessary for his human vocal cords.

Aimee couldn't deny that she was somewhat impressed with Josh's ability to conjure up a spare magazine for his gun like that, but she wasn't exactly an expert in weaponry, so she knew that having her impressed wasn't much of a compliment.  Wesley, yes, her, no.  She'd never handled a gun in her life.

That definitely didn't mean she'd be useless, though.  She didn't crowd Wes' personal space like he was demanding that Melisande do, but she kept close, mostly for her friend's sake.  If anything happened, she was going to be doing her best just to keep Melisande out of danger, and that meant away from the boys if they were going to be fighting.  Honestly, she didn't expect much in the way of fighting, not in broad daylight in Central Park, but stranger things had happened, she was sure.  It just didn't seem like a good idea to her to bring Melisande along when they were looking for someone who may be in danger or around someone else who was dangerous.  Of course, Melisande wasn't going to take no for an answer, and Wes HAD already agreed.  They'd just have to be careful.

Yep, and right there, they weren't.  Melisande stopping was one thing, but then she was off while the men were trading comments about what their friend WASN'T doing.  Meanwhile, hers was doing what they didn't want.  Aimee was after her instantly, leaving the men to figure out what was going on and follow. 

"Melisande!  Where are you going?" she called out, hoping to get the girl to stop and TALK.  She didn't know what had prompted the sudden feeling the girl had gotten, and she didn't usually question those things, but running off like that just didn't sound like a good thing to her.  She wasn't exactly expecting Melisande to just FIND Drew like that, though.

She was wrong.  Melisande ducked into an alley suddenly, and Aimee just stopped dead when she saw red hair.  That had to be...impossible, but it wasn't.  It was real.  How?  "Is he a--alright?" she asked, having been about to ask if he was alive, but that wording probably would have upset Melisande, even if it was a concern.  Tact was key.

There was a trail of colourful explicatives from Wesley as he ran after the two women who suddenly decided to break free of the party and go on a little side mission of their own. The closer to them he got, though, the closer to something else he got - Drew's scent. With Joshua at his heels and swearing all the way, he arrived just as Mel ducked around the corner.

"Oh shit," he breathed. Let him be alive.

He heard Silvera say the words, "Un-fucking-believable," as he pushed passed the lion and went into the alley. There was muffled noises, and then relieved laughter. Wes came around the corner to find Melisande stuck to Drew's side like a backpack while Silvera crouched down to try and look for head injuries.

Of course she knew where to look - Melisande always knew. She cried out, and flung herself at Drew, voice escalating to a high-pitched, shrill nervous explosion of phrases, things that hardly seemed intelligible except perhaps to other women. As soon as she had him conscious, she was wrapping her arms so tightly around him that if he'd any broken ribs, she'd probably make them worse.

"Oh my God, oh my God," she breathed, burying her face into his neck. Warm tears spilled down from her cheeks again, splashing onto his skin, as she no doubt squeezed the air out of him with all of her yanking and holding.

Josh practically had to push her out of the way to try and check for a concussion, while posing questions such as, "Where in the fuck have you been?"

Aimee knew enough of the situation by the time Josh and Wes caught up the last few steps to know that she wasn't needed in the mix.  She was glad to see Drew found and seemingly alive, since he started stirring with Melisande clinging to him, but she wasn't particularly close to him.  Her concern had been over Melisande, and the fact that she'd liked him when she met him, and didn't want to see anything bad happen to a good person.  These were his friends, and his new girl.  Aimee allowed them a few steps of space, and merely watched the situation.

For as 'uninvolved' as Aimee was behaving, Drew was pretty much in the opposite end of the ring where 'calm' was concerned.  The very first thing he noticed upon being TACKLED and SQUEEZED was that he had a MASSIVE headache, and something was clinging to him and making a LOT of noise that did NOT help his head.  Then, he had the opportunity to squint his eyes open against the light, realize that he was in an...alley? with Melisande clinging to him and crying, and that Josh and Wes were both looking pretty pole-axed.  At least Josh was asking questions, though he didn't really feel like he had any answers.

What the HELL was going on?

It took him a few moments to get his shit together enough to even know what was happening right then, nevermind answering questions, but Melisande's grip seemed to loosen just a touch when he hugged her back, and his eyes adjusted without giving him more of a migraine.  It was really pretty tempting to just let his head fall back and pass out again, but something told him that wasn't for the best.  Then, little things started weaving back into his mind, and he was even more confused.

He'd never had memory problems before.  Why couldn't he remember more?

"Someone jumped me...a woman?  How the hell did I get here?" he finally put together, looking totally baffled.  This wasn't going to help them in figuring out what had happened, obviously.  "What's the time?"

It didn't occur to him that she'd knocked him out so many times that it had been DAYS later and not just hours.  It was daylight, and he'd last seen the sky at night.  He had no way of knowing, not until his brain caught up with itself and decided to remind him of other factors, like the fact that he hadn't eaten in days.  That was going to be a big deal after he could think straight. 

A spilling of "I'm sorry!"s came from Mel's mouth as she backed off of Drew only enough to allow him room to breathe. It wasn't until Josh physically moved her that she ended up crouched against the wall, as close as she could get without actually getting right in on the situation. She looked absolutely crestfallen, but she stayed quiet long enough for them to get the situation sorted... Sort of?

"All righty, cowboy, sit up and let me check you for a concussion," Josh said, crouching down in front of him and going through the motions of making sure Drew wasn't going to die in the next seven minutes. He gave him a good once-over, and then sat back a little before standing, offering a hand out. He wasn't surprised when Melisande jumped up as well, but he kept his trap shut on that matter - he was only slightly envious of Drew somehow landing the girl, but it wasn't an issue.

"Sooo... jumped by a woman. She probably slipped you something. Got your wallet and stuff still on you, or is that all gone?" he asked. He tried to skip the teasing for the moment - women could be thieves, muggers and murderers just as men could, he'd found - insanity didn't discriminate.

Melisande crept back in to touch his shoulder gently. "Honey, it's been like, two days," she said softly. "The whole police force is looking for you. We thought -- " she stopped short, her blue eyes filling with tears again. She shook her head. "At first I thought maybe you'd just decided to dump me without saying anything, and then Josh called me to see if you were at my apartment.. it took a full twelve hours for all of us to realize that you weren't anywhere we could find you." She bit her lip, looking pretty upset.

Wes nodded. "You gave us a good scare. Can you remember anything?" he asked, shooting a glance to Aimee. It plainly said, vampire, but it wasn't something he could say aloud at the moment. He rubbed his face a little, weary from all the adrenaline he'd had going through his system. "Josh, call the search off," he said with a little nod to Silvera.

Drew = o.O ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? !!!

---

Actually, Drew wouldn't be at all surprised when Josh settled in with the teasing about getting jumped by a woman.  He was a former Marine and a SWAT officer, and he'd been jumped by a woman?  And she'd managed?  What?

Yeah, he was expecting the jokes.  They were inevitable, but he really didn't think that Josh would have fared all that much better.  Drew knew better.  He wasn't a pushover.  Something was funky about that situation.

Josh was trying to find out if he had a concussion, which was fine with him, so he cooperated.  He ached, but nothing really stood out just yet.  He just generally felt like shit, and when one took into account the fact that he was jumped, he wasn't all that surprised.  Still, nothing stood out just yet, which was a good thing.  "I don' know what she did!  I remember gettin' to my car, she walked up, then I was somewhere else an' she's talkin' shit 'bout sittin' still an' my face or some weird shit!"

No, it didn't make sense to him.  At all.  It was about to get worse.

"TWO DAYS?!"

Forget the wallet, forget his credit cards or whatever.  Two days. 

He'd been taking Josh's hand, pulling himself shakily to his feet, and he almost fell right back down.  He'd have realized without much effort that it had been awhile, because his body FELT like it had been two days.  He hadn't eaten, he hadn't had anything to drink, he'd been hanging in chains all that time, because he hadn't been in that first room long.  Oh shit.  That's right.  She'd had him chained up.  It was all way too fuzzy, that was wrong, but he remembered that.  He somehow couldn't pull together her face, but he could remember that.  She'd had him chained there.  Who had chains?  For real?  How was he even alive?!  Didn't only serial killers have that shit?

He calmed suddenly, the gravity of the whole situation becoming very obvious very suddenly.  Call the search off?  He'd been gone two days, with no word.  He'd been in some crazy lady's basement or something, and he had no idea what she'd done.  This wasn't good.  This was the exact opposite.  He had to figure out what he remembered before he took time to relax, and they needed to figure out what had happened.  "I remember chains, in a dark room.  Can' remember her face, an' that makes no sense.  I thank there was someone else there, but can' remember that, either.  She kept talkin' 'bout paintin', though.  Paintin', an' me holdin' still.  Kept pissin' her off 'cause I wouldn'."

That was the big thing he remembered.  She didn't like him moving.  Really, he would have preferred to have this conversation JUST with Wes and Josh, since Melisande just looked like it was making her upset, but he knew better.  If he slept or something, he might forget things.  That wasn't acceptable.

From the looks of things, they were all content to just let Aimee vanish into the background, but she was playing close attention.  She may not get much credit for brains in her line of work, but she was a scientist for real.  She was watching, listening, and she was in agreement with Wes.  Vampire.  Definitely.

He glanced her way, and she nodded to agree.  There was no way to address it in front of Josh and Drew, but she was pretty sure that Melisande was going to realize the same thing.  Strange that two of the group that should have been the most capable of taking care of themselves were the least prepared.  That sort of irony killed her about humans.  She was going to have to talk to Melisande later, perhaps with Wes present.

"Melisande, why don't we get Drew back to the club.  That way he can get something to eat and relax a little, instead of out here?" she piped up, knowing that the girl would like something to do.  She looked like she was a wreck already.

Actually, Drew couldn't say that sounded bad.  Josh had gotten him as far as his feet, and then Melisande had crept in to touch his shoulder and just be close.  He liked it, and appreciated it, which was why he reached for her hand when she started to withdraw.  She seemed so worried, something that actually made him feel bad, even though he hadn't really done anything himself.  It wasn't like it was his fault, but he still felt bad.  The last thing he wanted was to be trouble in her life. 

Aimee's words seemed to fall on deaf ears as Melisande stared off into space, squeezing Drew's hand as tightly as he'd allow her to. She took a step closer to him, so happy to feel his warmth that she was practically beside herself - and she felt like she was, suddenly. She could only think of a handful of creatures strong enough to chain someone like Drew down in a basement, and the blood visibly drained out of her face when the notion finally hit her. She glanced between Aimee and Wes, eyes narrowing only slightly.

"I don't really feel like going back to the club. My apartment isn't that far - can we just go there? I can get Drew cleaned up and I know I've got food there. I can make you guys lunch or... something," she said, trailing off absently. She was still trying to wrap her head around the idea that a vampire had snatched her Drewbear off of the street. It didn't go over well, so when Wesley opened his mouth to suggest going back to the club like Aimee had suggested, Melisande found herself nearly gnashing her teeth at him. Luckily Drew and Josh had engaged in some sort of conversation by that point, because the gesture was out of character for her.

Wesley held up his hands, surprised. "Okay. Okay. Apartment," he said, giving in with a bewildered expression. She'd done all but give him a good scruffing for trying to go along with Aimee's suggestion, and her reaction was enough. She looked positively murderous at the moment towards anyone trying to put themselves between she and Drew, and it was amusing, but annoying. He moved by Aimee's side swiftly, watching Josh give Drew an arm to aid his cause of walking.

"....she always like that?" he asked, tone still betraying shock. "She seemed so... nice." He couldn't think of another way to put it.

It completely baffled Drew that going to Melisande's place would be a problem, and so he didn't consider it.  Aimee offered the club, Melisande disagreed, and he was cool with whatever they chose.  Melisande was holding his hand, squeezing it kind of tightly actually, and that was cool with him, too.  Basically, he was cool with just about whatever they decided right then, since he was feeling shitty, hunger and thirst were starting to set in as panic faded in the presence of safe people, and he was generally not in the mood to argue.

Melisande had that covered, apparently, but he didn't take a lot of notice.  Her aggression on the subject was lost while Josh addressed him, though he noticed that Wes gave in on the subject rather quickly.  He just didn't linger on that thought.

Aimee did, and she frankly thought it was hilarious.  She actually smirked, finding little Melisande pushing a full-grown male lion around to be too amusing to ignore.  She couldn't blame Wes, though.  Personally, she didn't see a reason to argue.  She'd call Eden, let him know what was going on, and he'd tell her to deal with it and let him know what happened.  As long as things went smoothly, Eden wasn't going to get involved, so long as he was well-informed.  If it got out of hand, then he'd step in and see what he could do.  As much of a pain as he could be, Aimee respected him for that.  He'd already offered to do what he could on this situation, considering Melisande's emotional involvement. 

Not that he didn't like the idea of having SWAT guys who owed him, either.

"Oh, don't act like such a housecat!" she teased Wes quietly, giving him a small shove.  "She's worried about him.  At least you know he'll be taken care of."

That much was true.  Josh was helping Drew along for as much as he needed it, and Melisande was hovering like she was going to carry him herself if the men didn't manage.  Not that Aimee really thought she could, but it was the general feel she got from the situation.  She was a little surprised at how much this man mattered to the girl, but if that was how it was, then she was determined to make sure it worked.  They had a lot to discuss, the three of them.

"Yay!" she cheered, more to herself than to anyone else, and commenced to sticking to Drew like a koala. She listened intently to Josh as he spoke, going through the motions of theories on what had happened. Her stomach twisted on the inside, though, as Melisande knew what the city kept within it, and it disturbed her to know that one of those kept things had taken her Drewbear and...  Well, what had happened? She wanted to know, but she knew better than to try and bother him for information. Josh had come to the same conclusion she had, which was that Drew would be useless without food, water, and real rest, which had Melisande cooking up ideas of her fluffy bed and lots and lots of pillows - and Drew, of course. She smiled in spite of the situation, and wiggled a little in her own way - she was like a happy puppy, so glad to have him back. It was... silly.

Wesley kept a healthy pace behind them, trying not to crowd them, for one, and using the opportunity to talk to Aimee without having to whisper quite so low. "I'm not acting like a house cat," he hissed through his teeth, turning his head to look down at her as they made the trek to Melisande's apartment. "And besides - I'd make a horrible pet. I'm as big as any normal couch, so they're shit for napping on." He spoke indignantly, almost, and fluffed a little, like a bird might, as he looked away.

"I can see that she's not going to let him out of her sight easily. We'll have to con her into relinquishing custody to Josh so that we can talk to her. I don't think it'll be hard for Josh, though. He's got oodles of questions, I'm sure - plus, he's Drew's best friend. He can think of something stupid to amuse him with while we corner her. How is it, by the way, that she can look right at me and just know? She psychic, or something?" he inquired, scratching his head absently.

He glanced back to her, watching how she interacted with Joshua and Drew, and then looked back at Aimee. "Really, it's a valuable talent to have, but I feel like it's going to get her into trouble sooner or later. It's easy to keep that blindfold on. It's almost nicer that way, until shit like this happens." He spoke ruefully, as though he wasn't quite up to terms with his own situation - and it wouldn't be fair to say that, precisely, but sometimes he wasn't exactly thrilled with the animal he had become. It was a tricky thing, to control such primal, base instincts. They were so much stronger than the ones humans claimed to have.

Drew was completely unaware of having been dubbed 'Drewbear' in Melisande's thoughts, and he only would have disliked it in front of Josh and Wes.  They'd never let him hear the end of it if THEY heard it, but he didn't mind nicknames from her in private.  What did he mind if she wanted to get all cute on him?  She was a cute girl, and he liked her, so there was no reason to have a problem with it.  As long as it didn't sacrifice any of his badass points with the other guys, he was cool with it.

Personally, Drew was cool with most things.  Not crazy ladies who freaked out and kidnapped him, but other than that?  He was pretty laid-back.  Going to Melisande's, chilling out, that all sounded fine with him.  Not that he would really be 'useless', but he'd appreciate hitting some necessities like food and water, and then figuring out what the hell had happened.  Sleep would probably be good, but he'd been out of commission for two days.  He really didn't think he wanted to sleep anymore.  He might not wake up for a few more days or something (okay, not really, but still).

Aimee giggled at Wes' reaction, finding his indignation even more indicative of the 'housecat' attitude she'd just accused him of having.  Naturally, she had thoughts along the lines of him making a 'horrible pet' and such things, but she already had one at home to worry about.  No need for trouble in that department. 

"She'll need time to fawn over him, but I think once he's settled and Josh lays in on him with questions, we'll be able to talk to her," she assured the lion, certain that it'd work out.  He'd see. 

That was when he got to the difficult question, and she hesitated.  The look she gave him wasn't very amused at all, and she shrugged somewhat.  Really, she wasn't sure.  "She just can.  We watch out for her, but for now, at least she knows who's a threat without being told.  Your friend probably could have used that," she pointed out.  Aimee had been born a leopard, so she didn't really 'get' the people who had problems with supernatural abilities.  It was natural to her, and it was just right.  She would hate to just be a human, with no ability to take care of herself.  Sure, the world could be scary even for shifters, but at least she had a fighting chance.  That scared her about Melisande, but the girl DID have that handy way of telling that people weren't human.  That made her a little more difficult to deal with. 

"This is it," she told him, stepping up to hold the door open for Josh and Melisande, who both seemed intent on making sure Drew made it inside without falling on his face.  Aimee was pretty certain he'd be fine, but she let them go and opted to be the door-lady.  It gave her a use for the time being.

As soon as they'd hit the door, Melisande got Drew onto the comfortable couch, and rushed into the kitchen to get food for him. She watched everyone else like a hawk for a few seconds in the kitchen doorway, trying to sort herself out. Vampires - she'd need to talk to Aimee, and probably Wesley too, about this. The food, though, came first. She ran out two glasses of water - one for Drew and one for Josh - and then went back in to start hacking up leftover chicken from the little game hen she'd bought the night before. She spooned out mashed potatos and whatever else she could find to make some semblance of a meal, and then brought it out to Drew. It actually looked like dinner. She'd even nuked it for a few minutes so that it was warm - well, on the outside, at least.

"Here, and don't worry if you can't finish it all, I can throw some Saran wrap on it and save it for later, okay?" She leaned forward and gave him a little kiss on the cheek, and then went back into the kitchen to arrange and re-arrange her silverware drawer as quietly as she could. She needed to think. What could anyone possibly have wanted with Drew? He was human - he was oblivious to everything around him, obviously. He didn't have any ability she could see, and she could even pick up on some latent talents if she tried hard enough - he was cold. He was stone cold human. So what gave? She sighed and threw a fork down, shutting the drawer with a bang.

Wesley lingered in the small 'dining room' area of her apartment, kicking out a chair for Aimee to sit in. He could already hear Josh cracking jokes on Drew and how crippled he looked, and glanced over to Melisande while she tried to fix her... spoon drawer? He glanced down at Aimee, and then nodded to the balcony.

"Mel, c'n you come here a second?" he asked. Instead of going out into the hall, he walked out onto the rather spacious balcony area, waiting for the two women to follow. The doors were double-paned and soundproofed, thank God. You couldn't live in the city without them.

"Okay, I'm going to cut right to the chase - It sounds like Drew came about this," he said, holding his fingers within milimeters of eachother, "close to getting brought into Midnight. Do you know anything that will help us catch whoever did it?" Way to be gentle, Wesley.

Mel's eyes widened. "What? I -- no! Oh, Jesus," she whispered, putting a hand to her face. "I don't even know anyone who... No," she said, shaking her head. She looked at Aimee for support. "Tell him," she whined.

Oh, he had it MADE, and he knew it!  Actually, he was feeling pretty shitty, so if he'd been left to his own devices, he'd have probably grabbed the easiest thing to eat he could have managed, then guzzled a glass of water or so and then passed out.  He wasn't exactly high-maintenance.  Getting chicken, mashed potatoes, a glass of water and all the fixin's was well more than his brain could have possibly expected, and the look he gave Josh clearly said that anything the man had to say was completely useless in the face of this.  He could tease all he wanted, but the fact of the matter was that Drew had Melisande, and she made the badness of this current situation look much less horrible.  They'd figure out what went on, and he was safe now, wasn't he?

Yep.  Safe, and being fed, and it was all good.

"Thanks," he told her, snagging his own kiss quickly as she withdrew, then went on with his reassurance.  She was upset, and he didn't want her upset on his account.  He was going to be fine.  "I'm sure finishin' won' be a problem at all."

He was just going to take it slow, because he knew how that worked.  He was hungry, and he was thirsty, because he hadn't had anything in days.  That meant that he'd make himself feel shittier if he rushed things, so he wouldn't.  Besides, he had plenty to deal with when Josh finally started in on him.  "I don' wanna hear your shit, man.  I didn' wimp out, that bitch mus' not have been alone," he asserted.  Yeah, he'd gotten jumped by a woman, but he knew better.  She couldn't have just overpowered him, and Josh could joke about that all he wanted, but it was true. 

That was his story, and he was sticking to it.

Watching Melisande and Drew together, Aimee couldn't help smiling, but she was worried.  Melisande wasn't the only one wondering why Drew would have been targeted, and there was one big problem with the situation as it stood: they didn't know if it was over.  Just because he'd been released didn't mean that it wouldn't lead to another incident, and if he didn't remember who he'd been around, he could have met anyone who might come after him now that he'd been seen in that setting.

It didn't take much, in some cases.  Just unlucky chance.

"I already told you, Wes, neither of us know anyone involved in Midnight.  Eden has people who are exotic breeds in his place, so he's careful.  We don't make it a point to entertain Midnight types," she explained.  "Actually, with Melisande around, we're even less inclined to knowingly have anyone like that in the club.  Humans are fair game, and none of us are going to risk that."

She gave Melisande a look, one of concern that really said that she didn't want to even THINK about such things, nevermind mention it out loud, but it was the truth.  "I just wish there was a way to know that he's really safe.  Obviously, nobody truly claimed him, or he wouldn't have just been left in the alley like that, but if it was Midnight, and it certainly sounds like it...anyone who saw him there might make a try at him."

Even worse, anyone who'd seen him might look into his life and see Melisande.  That's what Aimee couldn't stand the idea of.  The girl was officially going to be with a shifter or vampire from this point on.  No risks for awhile.

Wesley was only half-listening, his mind already working on gears that turned in a very backwards direction. What he could see was that there was a definite problem with his sudden group of friends and their humanity. Now, he could think of dozens of logical ways to fix the problem - posting details, being more careful, making sure that they were covered from all angles, but really when it boiled down to it, humans versus vampires, especially Midnight vampires... they didn't stand a chance. Freeblood was freeblood, and whoever had declared the law that shapeshifters were in fact, freeblood, was a Godsend.

He only hoped they'd see it his way.

There was something he'd been doing while Aimee spoke, something behind his back. He felt the familiar sting on his palm as he fidgeted quite silently, using the darkness of the balcony fixture to his advantage. He fixed his eyes on Melisande, and nodded a little.

"Hold out your hand for a second?" he asked. His voice was careful, trained - innocent enough.

"...don't see what more we can do, except have Nikki and Marius watch me 'round the clock. But what about Drew?" she stopped short, question hanging in the air like a blade over her neck, and glanced at Wesley.

"What?" she said, puzzled. She held out her hand, because it was such a strange Simon Says sort of request that she did it without thinking. There was a flicker of silver catching on the light from her living room, and she felt a strange burning sensation, warm and wet suddenly in the center of her palm.

"Wesley, what the f-"

Before Aimee or Melisande or anyone else could stop him, he'd firmly clasped his palm to hers.

"I fixed the problem," he said weakly. His voice was dry, as though it pained him to talk for a moment. He'd deal with the guilt of this later, because he knew that the hurricane of what he'd just done would only be a preamble to a massive shitstorm when everyone else found out how underhanded he'd just... handled it.

Melisande tried to yank her hand away, but Wesley's grip was firm enough that she just sort of flailed for a second. "Wes, nn-- NO!" she shouted. She wanted a choice in this matter, damnit!

"Aimee!" she wailed, tugging uselessly against his weight. When he let go, it was sudden, enough that her back hit the cool brick wall of the building, making a surprised gasp pop out of her that she could have kicked herself for had she not suddenly felt so dizzy. She'd wanted a choice, she'd wanted a choice!

Wesley stepped back, hands in front of him. "It was either me or her," he said, as though it explained everything.

So much for discussing this.

Aimee should have been paying attention, and she knew that as soon as Wes made his move.  She should have seen the danger coming well before it ever actually became a danger, but why would she ever expect him to behave like that?  He was a COP, it was his job to protect people, and he'd sounded so completely normal about asking her to hold out her hand that it didn't even occur to her that she might need to worry.

Not until the blade was already flashing, and he was already squeezing his hand against Melisande's.  Not until it was too late.

She yelled, something along the lines of 'Wes!' and 'No!', before grabbing at his arm.  Fortunately, she had the sense because Angie warned the author of this post where the characters are situated not to actually jump AT him, or they may have gone through a window or off the balcony.  Instead, she clamped her arms around his, trying to pry his hand loose without drawing more blood for the instant before he let go.  It took seconds, all of it, and it was over.  There was nothing she could do.

Well.  That wasn't true.  She could beat him senseless, but there was nothing she could do to fix what he'd just done.

"What's wrong with you?!  You have to ASK about something like that!  Are you just going to bleed all over your friends, too?!" she demanded, punching at his chest or arm, whichever he opted to even let her hit, and she intended to hit him HARD.  He deserved it, the ass!  "Will you even tell them what's happening, or are you just going to force them into this mess?!"

Ooooh, this was fucked up!  She swung at him again, not even caring if it hit just because she wanted to lash out, and she turned her focus on Melisande.  She was going to need help getting through this, because the infection was going to feel horrible.  "Come on, honey, let's go wrap that up.  I'm so, so sorry..."

Wes took the hits, as he should have, though they didn't really seem to bother him much. Maybe they did hurt, but what really stung was knowing what he'd just done. He was a police officer, yes, and as such, he had to make swift decisions on the fly and hope that the call he'd made was the best one. In this case, he felt he had no other choice. He turned and punched the wall hard enough to knock a clump of it off, the sound a solid impacted noise. Flecks of dust and brick scattered, falling the length of several stories below to land in the alley behind the apartment building.

"Aimee," he said, following her inside. He blatantly ignored Josh and Drew's questioning glances, and even questions, following the girls straight back to Melisande's bathroom. He gingerly picked his way around her trainwreck of a room, and stood, looming in the bathroom doorway as Melisande sobbed while Aimee tried to clean out her hand.

"Aimee," he said again, sighing. "We could talk around in circles about what should have happened, but we'd have come to the same point. It was either you, or it was me, and I chose me, right then, right there, because let's face it - sometimes you just have to act. Now, as for bleeding all over my friends, as you so eloquently phrased it, one of two things can happen: I can go out there with my bleeding fist and punch Josh square in the face, thusly infecting him, too - and I can do just the same to Drew, as I wager he won't be in much shape to move."

He ignored Mel's garbled protest, and pressed on. "But do we really need three male lions? Really, I find it absolutely unnecessary. So, either I can go out there, and make this giant clusterfuck even worse, or we can go into the kitchen, fix them both drinks, and you can just drop some blood into the glasses. We can bend over, kiss our asses goodbye, and hope there's something left when the dust settles, but either way, something, some sort of decision, has to happen here, tonight, right now."

Why did Wesley do this? Why did he deal only in absolutes? It probably was the lion in him, or the man in him, or a combination of both, but really, it didn't matter. The why never mattered, just that it happened, whatever it was. In this case, he was playing roulette with the lives of his best friends. "Whether you think I'm callous or an asshole or whatever you want, at this point, is moot, because you'll never really see where I'm coming from. You could try, but you won't."

He folded his arms uselessly then, looking down at his knuckles. He'd taken a chunk out of the brick corner of that wall, and it would have effectively crippled his hand had he been human. As it stood, the bones were already trying to mend themselves, and the only thing holding them off was his level of stress and fatigue.

It was really for the best that Aimee mostly ignored Josh and Drew as she swept Melisande through the apartment, since anything she'd said about Wes would have sounded like he was psychotic and something horrible had happened.  Despite her opinions on that matter, he really wasn't crazy.  Something horrible may have happened, though.

"Just a little cut, it'll be fine," she explained simply, and then Wes was following, and the two remaining humans in the apartment were left in the dark once more.  Honestly, she didn't think Drew had the brainpower available to worry about it more than the fact that Melisande was crying and upset, and Josh wouldn't know where to start, so they had a few moments to decide what to do.

Of course, Wes was already decided.  Why wouldn't he be, with the way he just made up his mind about everyone else's lives?  "Wes, I see the why, and it makes sense, but these are your friends.  This is MY friend you just infected without any warning!  You really think we should just slip some blood into a drink, or you should go out there and hurt them, without any warning?  What if we explain the situation to them, and at least TELL them what's going on?" she asked.  She wasn't stupid, she knew it could blow up in their faces, but wasn't it going to blow up anyway?  Did they REALLY want three brand new shifters all at once, two of whom had no idea what was happening?

Was she really going to grant the world two new leopards?  Hell, she SURE as hell knew that three male lions in one area was just ASKING for trouble, but this was a big deal to just decide.  That was why she wanted to tell the two of them what was going on.  Melisande hadn't been given a choice, but at least she knew about shapeshifters.  These two had no idea whatsoever. 

Actually, Melisande was a good person to get input from.  "Don't move," she warned Wes, just in case he got antsy and just WENT.  She wanted to hear Melisande get something in there before the infection set in and she couldn't think straight.  "Honey, I know this situation is horrible, but Wes has a point.  I still don't agree with his ridiculously blunt tactics, but if Josh and Drew are going to be infected, it looks like it's going to be leopard or lion.  I'm not going to give your boy a dirty drink if you say not to, but given Wes' alternative, it might be better for him."

Actually, they could give Josh and Drew 'dirty drinks' with either lion or leopard, but leopard DID make the most sense.  That just meant that Aimee had to bleed for it, which she would, but she wasn't going to if Melisande argued it.  That just wasn't fair, and this affected the girl more than Aimee, so she wasn't going to make demands.

Melisande was still trying to grit her teeth as Aimee tried as gently as she could to clean out her hand. When the hydrogen peroxide came out, though, she had to look away, and with Wes' infuriating tirade, it made the situation worse. She had nothing comforting to think about, because he was just going on and on about what he was going to do - the choices they were left with, so on, so forth. She responded to his silence by kicking the door from her spot on top of the closed toilet rather violently. It swung back and cracked Wes in the face, and she kicked it again when it bounced back. He'd stepped back in surprise, and that had given it enough room to shut.

There were too. Many. QUESTIONS. "I don't know," she had been saying as Aimee began asking her things, over and over, which eventually exploded into a very shouted, heated, "I DON'T KNOW!" She knew she was going to attract unwanted attention, and she didn't care at this point. She was still reeling with the idea that her humanity had just been stolen from her. As soon as she could, she was going to attempt to kick the shit out of one Wesley Bishop, whether she was game for it or not.

"I can't think about this right now. There's so much to explain, it's too hard to try and line it all up. I can't tell you what I think, because I can't THINK STRAIGHT right now!" she shouted. She didn't mean to yell at Aimee, but really, she wasn't - she was yelling to yell, to try and alleviate herself of some of this sudden rushing anger.

From outside the door, Wesley offered no comfort. "Well, you'd better try," he hissed. "Josh is stalking down the hallway with that look on his face, and -- oh, fuck it."

WHAM.

There was a muffled cry, and the sound of something heavy falling and hitting the ground, and then silence.

Melisande jumped up, scrambling for the door and flinging it open. She saw Wesley standing there, looking incredibly heated and rather sheepish at the same time, and just stared.

"I hit him with the other hand," was all he said. He was bent over Josh's layed-out figure, head tilted to the side slightly. "That's for upper-decking me, if you can hear me." He looked up. "He's out cold. WHAT?" he demanded, to her irrationally psychotic stare. "You wanted time to think, I gave you time to think. He had it coming, anyways. He really did upper-deck me."

Melisande held her hands up in the air. "This is insane. You're insane," she laughed, that nervous, high-pitched giggle threatening to bleed into hysteria at any moment. She paused. "And... do I even WANT to know what 'upper decking' is?"

From down the hall, she could hear Drew saying, "IT'S WHEN YOU SH..." and tuned him out.

This was ALL ridiculous, and what was currently happening was a perfect example of why men were NOT allowed to handle difficult situations.  Wes had already infected Melisande, been hit in the face with a door twice by the time Melisande was done, and then proceeded to knock one of his best friends senseless in a matter of just a few moments.

If Aimee hadn't just had a lot of screaming go on in her face, she might have been more affected by the violence outside.  As it was, she rolled her eyes, took a deep breath, and just let Melisande run out the door to find Wes standing there, Josh splayed out totally unconscious on the floor, and Drew screaming something entirely un-helpful about male idiocy from the living room.

Did she REALLY want to add these morons to the leopard population?

Staring at Josh on the floor, as well as the bruising he was already developing thanks to Wes, she sighed.  Melisande had turned to giggles that bordered on hysteria, and Aimee tried to herd her back into the bathroom before moving to Josh's side and glancing up at Wes.  "Him, I'll do.  Melisande has to have a say in what happens to Drew because she's going to have to deal with it afterwards, but I'll take care of Josh."

She didn't ever want to see him splayed out like this again, and when you took vampires into account, that was all too possible for a human.

Melisande shook her head. "I'll do it myself," she whispered. She didn't like the idea of two lions running around, but really, she couldn't put that sort of responsibility on Aimee. She'd just get to Drew later, maybe when she had a chance to explain it to him. She didn't even know how to begin - or where, for that matter. Was it childhood, for her? Further back? As much as she knew about the Nyeusi? Did she tell him about All Hallows specifically? How much could she possibly corrupt his mind? She put her hands on her face and groaned.

Wesley, in the mean time, seemed just dandy with all that was happening - or, at least, he'd regained most of his self control. He looked at Aimee. "You can punch him, too," he offered. He cast his eyes down at Josh and sighed a little. He felt bad on the inside - really, really bad. What choice did he have, though, really? He sighed, crossing his massive arms, and went to go check on Drew. "Don't worry, I won't punch him," he muttered at the two women after their crazed expressions at him when he turned to announce he was going to go check on Drew.

Melisande sat down on her bed, tucking her knees up to her chin as she watched Aimee stand over Josh. "What a mess," she sighed. "Won't Nero be mad to find out you're passing your leopard-ness around? I think I'd be kind of angry if this was reversed and Drew decided to share and share alike. I'm also a very jealous girl, though," she said, attempting at a joke. The laugh that followed was wry, but... an effort.

Aimee glanced at Melisande when she said she'd do it herself, considering the implications of that.  She was going to offer to help, anyway, but after Wes was gone.

"I am NOT going to punch him," she asserted, though there was the 'unless he deserves it' in the back of her mind there.  Knowing these guys, he might yet.  Still, if she was going to have to infect him to keep Wes from going crazy, she was going to be nice about it.  Punching him just wasn't fair, and she could find a painless way, including the drink idea.  She'd think of something, and it would be monumentally better than 'lol you can punch him'.

She almost rushed Wes when he said he was going for Drew, but refrained with the thought that they'd declared that Mel was going to address that and he knew he wasn't supposed to do anything drastic.  She still felt better when he assured them that he wasn't going to punch the guy, though. 

"Oh, my God.  I think that man is going to give me a heart attack yet," she sighed, just sitting down on the floor next to Josh, and looking up at Melisande.  "I don't know if Nero would be mad, but I hope not.  It's not like I'm going to have to get personal with Josh to infect him.  Like Wes said, it could be as impersonal as putting some blood in his drink," she explained.  Really, why would Nero be upset?  She stripped for a living, and this was much less personal.  Of course, she didn't make anything about her job personal, either, but this LOOKED less personal.  She didn't see the problem, though she still wasn't positive she wanted to have more leopards running around.  Pride in her breed.  Even so, a male leopard was less troublesome than a male lion, that much she knew from her father.  She'd never actually met a male leopard she wasn't related to.  Lions, though...she'd heard things, besides what she'd seen from Wes, and it didn't take much to understand that there were similarities to nature.  "Melisande, if you want, I can give you some of my blood to infect him with.  It's up to you, but it doesn't have to be yours, and it doesn't have to be lion.  You're the one who has to deal with him, so if you'd prefer to be the same, I understand, but multiple male lions in the same area CAN get...aggressive.  I wouldn't be surprised if he and Wes had problems after this."

Actually, she could see how that might actually be good for Wes.  Drew might get his ass kicked, because Wes was big and she wasn't so sure that the redhead could have quite enough crazy to combat that size (though, he WAS a Marine...), but it might do Wes some good to have some competition.  Who knew?  They were going to find out one way or the other if Melisande went with lion, though. 

Seriously, if Drew hadn't been feeling like shit on a stick, he'd have been freaking out about all this.  He'd eaten his food and BS'd with Josh while Wes and the girls were talking, and then suddenly Melisande's crying and Aimee's talking about broken glass or something, and Wes is abusing the building and following them.  What the HELL?!

He and Josh were just completely ignored by the trio, which wasn't at all cool, but really, Drew wasn't going to bitch.  He was feeling like letting Aimee deal with whatever was going on, since he'd pretty much been told to stay put, and he didn't feel up to moving if he didn't have to.  Josh wasn't quite so easy to deal with, though.

"Dude, don'," he said, and he'd tried.  Then, Josh was off after Wes, trying to figure out what the hell was going on, and then, Josh was down.  Oh, and he wasn't just DOWN.  Drew couldn't see it, but he HEARD it, and he flinched upon impact.  He could only imagine what the hell that had felt like, and he winced in appreciation.  He might have even gone to Josh's aid, but then Wes yelled about the upper-decking, and he couldn't argue.  Actually, he was sure to shout an explanation when Melisande asked what it was.

He was just helpful like that.

He stayed put, though.  There wasn't anything he could do about it, and he wasn't really involved in that one.  He couldn't argue that Josh deserved it, and it sounded like Josh was out cold.  Otherwise, he'd be yelling.  That meant that Drew was going to sit his ass down and let Wes cool off without getting punched, because he really, really didn't need more abuse.  His arms were aching, and he'd found marks on his wrists from the chains.  Apparently, after his other needs were cared for, the less obvious ones had decided to show up.  He was fine not running around like a maniac right then.  He was lucky he wasn't sleeping.

"Dude, what the hell is happenin'?  You're all actin' batshit an' not talkin' 'bout it," he pointed out when Wes walked in.  He was feeling like shit, not stupid. 

Melisande nodded. "Yeah, I guess I forget how they can be. I don't watch enough Animal Planet, it looks like." She sighed a little, trying to ignore the palm of her hand still tingling from the peroxide and whatever else Aimee had used to clean it with - not that it mattered, now. She could go play in a bin of rusty nails, now, and never worry about tetanus.

"I'll figure something out. Maybe when he's healed up, and the dust settles a little, I can try to ease him into this, and actually give him a choice. I mean, I don't want Wesley to feel like this is his only option and then completely destroy their friendship. Oh, this is so hard!" she exclaimed, punching her pillow a little.

"I guess I'd better go check on him, anyways. You have this?" she asked, nodding to Josh laid out on the floor. With Aimee's return nod, she went out into the living room, coming into the conversation that had already been happening.

"Oh, I wish I could tell you," Wes said, wrapping a towel around his hand before Drew noticed that it was already healing. He plopped down on the smaller sofa Melisande had, and slouched forward a little, appearing to favour the hand he'd hit the wall with. "But Josh never even saw it coming," he said, laughing. "I told 'im I was gonna get him back for that when he least expected it. I figure since we're all in here and as safe as we're gonna get, it couldn't hurt to repay him for... ugh. I had to pay someone else to clean it," he said with a shudder.

And really, it was sort of true. Especially the bit about 'getting him back'. At the appearance of Melisande, though, he leaned back in the chair and fell silent, watching what she was going to do and say.

Melisande sat down on the couch once she'd moved Drew's legs so that they fell over her lap, delicately putting her good hand to rest on one of his knees. "Broken glass on the balcony. Beer bottle from last week - didn't even see it 'til I'd put my hand in it." She held her bandaged hand up. "You sure you don't want in on this? Wes cut himself, too, but he hit the wall and just made it worse. Animal," she said, glaring at him. She meant it.

She turned back to Drew, flashing him that smile that was so cherubic and sweet. "Josh is being taken care of by nurse Aimee, now, though, so don't worry about him. How are you feeling?" She wasn't feigning the fact that she cared, either - she wanted Drew to say he was feeling better, but she knew he wouldn't. He probably felt like hammered shit. "When they go, I'll get the bed set up for you," she offered.

Aimee nodded, understanding Melisande's thoughts on the matter.  Personally, she was all for waiting and talking things through with Josh and Drew rather than just hitting them with it all before they knew what was coming.  Wes had already rushed things with Melisande and caused a mess, which he still deserved to get his ass kicked for.

She wondered what Drew would say when he found out exactly what had happened. 

In th meantime, she smiled and nodded when Melisande asked if she had the Josh situation.  "Go ahead, I'll deal with Josh.  Hopefully, I can wake him up," she assured the girl, knowing that Drew would be in good hands with Melisande out there.  Wes couldn't possibly be stupid enough to try anything right then.

Though, she'd been wrong about that one before.

Regardless, she could hear what was going on as well as Wes would be able to hear whatever happened in the hall with Josh, so she'd stay up to date.  She ended up going into the bathroom to get a cold, wet washcloth, and squeezed some of the water onto Josh's face before actually dabbing at the area of impact itself.  It really wasn't fair for Wes to nail his human friends like this, she decided, but at least it didn't seem like that would be a problem much longer.  She wished she was at home for this, simply because they had lab equipment, such as syringes, that would be much more professional and less barbaric. 

"Josh?  Wake up," she instructed him as he started to stir, trying to be gentle on his damaged face, and that was reflected in her tone.  She already felt bad about all this, and that wasn't going to go away anytime soon.

What?  Why couldn't Wes telling him what was going on?  He knew that Josh couldn't have possibly seen the blow coming, not from how fast it had all happened.  Drew had heard it all, and Josh had only had time to make some pained noise upon impact, and that had been it.  It didn't take much to know what had meant, that Wes had nailed him without anything to warn him, and Drew knew why it had been done.  That didn't explain the rest. 

He got the feeling that Wes was using it to distract from everything else.  He just didn't know what he was being distracted from, so it was hard to ask.

No, this wasn't making sense.  Melisande came back in, which he was pleased about, but she was saying it was broken glass, and that Wes had cut himself, then hit the wall.  Why?  Because he'd cut himself on a beer bottle?  That made no sense.  He'd never known the guy's temper to be THAT bad, and then hauling off and nailing Josh like that and saying it was for the prank?  Yeah, Josh deserved it for that, which was something even Drew wouldn't do, but this seemed like bad timing.  What the hell.

If he'd had even the slightest idea what was going on, he'd have found the 'you sure you don't want in on this?' and 'josh is being taken care of by nurse Aimee, now' to be uncharacteristically ominous, so it was good that he didn't know.  He had no clue that his humanity, and that of his best friend, were in such danger, or that his girlfriend was now anything but.  Or, that it was Wes' fault that she wasn't human anymore.  That was going to piss him off, later.  Now, he was just confused, and his brain wasn't up to the task of pushing for information.

He groaned, leaning back and closing his eyes for a minute.  "I'm feelin' better, a little, but there's somethang y'all ain't sayin' an' I jus' don' have the energy to figure it out," he complained, perhaps thinking that if he complained about it, they'd tell him instead of accepting that he didn't have the energy and leaving it at that. 

Who knew?  Maybe being kidnapped and not being able to remember important details (when Drew seriously had the best memory of anyone in the damn apartment) just had him feeling paranoid.  He could tell himself that was what it was, and see if he still felt that way after he'd had time to recover.  Right.

Josh didn't want to wake up, because his head felt like he'd been hit by a truck. Close enough, Wes had socked him square in the jaw. He didn't know how nothing was broken, but he spit out a little blood when he sat up slowly. Bit the inside of his cheek when he fell over, damnit. Aimee's voice and the cool cloth didn't hurt him any, though, and he lifted a hand, missing the cloth the first time to try and take it from her. He ended up pressing it down on his jaw, hand on top of hers, and then let it go suddenly.

"I think I'm alive," he winced. It took him a minute to place everything in order. "Let me guess. He finally got me back for my last prank? It's either that or I mortally offended him in some way," he muttered, leaning against the wall in the hallway. They were far enough down that if anyone heard them, it'd be Wesley, and that was due to his hearing. He wasn't listening, though, so Josh was relatively safe.

He flashed her that lazy, feline smile that he had, eyes half closed. "Hey beautiful. Why they got you down here taking care of me? They all go out for beers and leave me layin' in the hallway?" he asked, half-ready to believe it. It had happened before. Josh would get him back though, oh yes he would.

Melisande sighed a little. "I'll tell you when you're better," she said. That was all he'd get out of her, but it was the most honest truth she'd ever told. She would tell him. She just... openly hoped that he recovered slowly so she could think of a way to say it without making him run off.

She wouldn't have blamed him if he'd said he felt like he'd been hit by a truck, especially having been just in the bathroom when it had happened.  She'd heard it, and it hadn't sounded good.  Poor Josh was only human.

For now.

She managed a smile at his declaration that he was alive, holding the cloth to his face after he'd felt it (and her hand) there and decided to sit up.  Really, she thought he was lucky that Wes hadn't broken his jaw or knocked any teeth out.  "He claims you deserved it for the prank," she informed him, shaking her head.  Those pranks of theirs were utterly ridiculous.  "And I have to agree."

Had it been her who suffered that, Josh would be a mouse shifter, compliments of Nero.  Or perhaps a bunny.  Something cute and useless.  There was that Turkish Van, too.  Aimee DID love Nero's cat, and she'd seen the boy Nero had infected with it.  It was utterly adorable.  Josh had better watch who he pranked. 

She laughed a little, amazed that he could pull off that lazy smile of his after getting smashed in the face like that, but he was a sweet guy.  "I think I'm the only one who would take care of you.  Melisande is busy fawning over Drew, and I hope you didn't think I'd let Wes near you again for awhile?"  Hell no.  Josh would end up a lion for sure if that was the case, and she'd already decided that he wasn't going to get that.  Now, to just get to that point.  She wanted to explain. 

Easier said than done.

Drew lifted his head and just stared at Melisande for a moment when she said she'd tell him when he was better.  He believed her, that wasn't the issue.  The thing that gave him pause was that she'd just admitted that there was something going on that he wasn't getting.  So, he wasn't being paranoid.  It was true.

Okay, he could wait.

"Aight.  Sounds like a plan," he agreed, and it was that easy.  The fact that he knew it wouldn't take him long to recover was useful, though.  He'd been fed and watered, and he was going to need sleep.  Other than that, he'd be fine.  It was just rest from here, since anything else wrong with him consisted of muscle aches and confusion.  The confusion wasn't going to just lift, he was pretty sure of that, so he wasn't going to wait on that.  Melisande really didn't have long to mull things over.

He let out a dry laugh at the notion of Drew being fawned over. That idea still boggled him - how did someone as goofy as Drew get the girl, and Josh was... on his ass in the hallway with a damn-near broken jaw? He shook his head a little, which made his brain feel like it rattled against the inner-lining of his skull, and gritted his teeth. "Ouch," he hissed, trying to sit up more to take some weight off of his arm, which had been propping him mostly up in his slumped sort of position. He smiled a little again as Aimee dabbed at some of the blood on his face, and rolled his eyes.

"Maybe. Wes seemed to really be pissing you off outside, from what I could hear. Drew was sort of out of it, but... Is there something that I need to know? About what's going on, I mean." He frowned. "I'm not stupid, you know. I've known Wesley for a long time, and I've known you long enough to know that I don't think you yell at people unless you have a reason."

Josh stared evenly at her, but his blank face broke into a little smile again. "Whatever it is, it can't be as bad as Drew being kidnapped and abused by some crazy woman. She evidently chained him in her basement, yelled at him about drawing him or something, knocked him out a few times, and then just... dumped him off in the alley. How weird is that?" he asked.

Aimee really didn't find the situation with Melisande and Drew as strange as Josh seemed to, since she could somewhat see why Melisande liked him.  He was goofy and Aimee really couldn't take that hick southern accent seriously, but there was something about him that seemed...just geniune.  Aimee didn't get the impression that he was playing games, and that was what she personally liked about him.  Melisande could certainly do worse, and Aimee personally thought the two of them were cute together.  She just didn't like that trouble was showing up.

She ended up hesitating when he asked about Wes pissing her off, and couldn't deny that he was right.  She didn't yell at people without a reason, and actually didn't yell much anyway.  Wes just made her feel crazy!  He was so impulsive, doing stupid things without a single thought, that it made her crazy.  She really didn't know what to tell Josh on that subject, though.  She hadn't wanted to just jump right into the conversation, but she wasn't going to lie to him.  He didn't have much time to think about things before Wes was going to start freaking out again.  Wes seemed to think that if they left the apartment or something as humans, they'd be dead or in Midnight.  She understood the concern, but she really didn't think that rushing it now was going to matter.  Waiting too long would be stupid, but she didn't like rushing important decisions, and Wes ruining his friendship with these two because he couldn't be even a little patient wasn't conducive to the situation.

"It's very weird," she agreed, and she forced a smile, but this was it.  "Actually, that's what we were arguing about.  What happened to Drew...it's not that out of the ordinary.  Not the crazy woman who wanted to draw him, that I've never heard about before, but I think he was really, really lucky that it was her.  If it was someone else, we may never have gotten him back, and even if we had, he wouldn't have been himself anymore."

She hesitated once more, not really sure how to drop a bomb like this to someone who was never going to believe it.  "Josh, this is all going to sound extremely crazy, so before I tell you anything, you have to promise me that you're going to stay right here with me, sitting calmly in this hallway and talking.  No rushing out into the living room to say anything to Wes, or anything like that.  There's something big going on, and I'm trying to keep Wes from doing anything rash."

Like, punching Josh and making him a lion if the guy jumped up and freaked out in the living room. 

Josh remained in his upright sitting position, looking at Aimee with open, attentive eyes. His brows raised just a little, expectantly, as though he were waiting for her to continue. He realized that she was waiting for him to acknowledge her request not to stand up and run off. He wondered what could be so shocking that he was about to hear that would cause him to do that -- really, Josh was still in no condition to run, anyways, and the thought of having a mildly shocking story told to him by a beautiful woman was one he deigned to entertain. He smiled a little, that same casual, lazy feline grin as he always had, and lifted his chin just a little.

"I want to quote Pulp Fiction and say that I can't promise you my reaction without knowing what you're going to tell me, but I think I'm still seeing spots from when Wesley broke my face, so I'll humour you by just saying," and he sighed a little, "Okay Aimee. I won't run away, whatever you tell me." His tone went from the exasperated, tired sound back to his normal jovial and slightly pained voice, despite his most valiant effort not to look hurt. "Now, what is it that's so bad it's got everyone going crazy?"

He waited, and wondered - what could she possibly tell him that was going to make him want to bolt? Maybe it was the boy in him, but Aimee was too pretty to deliver news that shocking. Right?

He had a point in bringing up Pulp Fiction, and the general idea behind that was totally true.  He didn't know what she was going to say, so promising not to react badly was out.  "Thank you.  I don't want you to promise not to freak out, anyway.  I just want you to stay here with me until I finish, and try to be calm about it," she assured him.  Try.  That's what she wanted.  She wanted him consciously thinking about the fact that she wanted him to try to be calm and to stay where he was, because maybe that'd make him more likely to do it.

Okay.  Time to tell him.  "Drew was kidnapped by a vampire." 

HA!  There.  She said it, and she waited a heartbeat, staring at him with a totally serious expression so that he'd know she wasn't kidding, and then she shot off with the rest before he had a chance to say a damn thing.  She was going to get this out before he could talk over her.  "Yes, they exist, and there is a group of them who operate a slave trade that we're pretty sure Drew came dangerously close to disappearing in, what with his mention of chains and being knocked out the way he was, not to mention the memory issues.  Wes is freaking out because he's a shapeshifter and he knows about the vampires just like Melisande and I do, and he knows that Drew got lucky.  The problem is that now the vampires know what Drew looks like, where he lives, all of his information, and anyone could come after him again at any time, and just as easily find you.  We don't want to lose you two, so we've been yelling and arguing about what to do to fix the problem."

That was the long and short of it, basically.  Now, to get him through his disbelief, which was probably going to involve laughter, mentions of her being crazy, and then questions.  She wasn't looking forward to it, and actually made a face.  "And please don't call me crazy.  I know it sounds crazy, but I'm not and I'm really worried about you two."

Aimee was too pretty to deliver news that shocking. Right?

WRONG.

His first reaction was to laugh, but he didn't even get that much out before she went forward with her words, and the laugh died somewhere in his chest, a dull hissing sound escaping through his tightly clenched teeth as he realized that Aimee wasn't trying to kid around with him. He sat back quick enough that he banged his head against the wall, which startled him and hurt, but seemed to... ground him. Why was it that the men in this apartment thought better when they were in pain? It was a trait that they all seemed to share, or at least Joshua and Wesley did - Drew probably would say that he "c'n thank jes' fine, thanks" without any extra added help from the sudden nerve explosion right before beta endorphins kicked in.

Speaking of which - the swell of warmth around the back of his head let him know that his had begun to do their job, and he felt his chest sink with a little relief as he realized that that was as good as this night was going to get. From here, it was all downhill. He tried to take a... logical approach to what Aimee had said, because personally, he thought she was crazy, but he wanted to try and get back to the living room without alarming her.

"Aimee, are you sure Wesley didn't bump you on the noggin too before he went back out there?" he asked cautiously. "I don't think I'll call you crazy, but don't you'd think I'd have known about this sooner if that was really the case? Wes, Drew and I are inseparable. We'd have known if he was a.. what did you call him? A shapeshifter? What does he shift into, anyways, a refrigerator?"

The look on Joshua's face plainly said that he thought she was crazy. "I think I can stand up now," he said. He pushed himself up off the ground. He was keeping his promise by not freaking out, but there was no way he was going to sit there and listen to this batshit story when there were real problems to work out.

Well, he didn't freak out.  That was good.  She didn't want him to get his proof by getting punched in the face and infected.

Josh was right about Drew being able to think without the beta endorphins, and he'd say so just like Josh thought, too.  Whatever worked for different people, though.  Aimee personally didn't need to hit her head to think straight, though Josh was probably in disagreement with her on that one currently.  That was fine, she expected it.

"I knew you wouldn't believe me.  Wes is a lion, who I'm willing to bet is about as big as a refrigerator, but I haven't actually seen him shift, so I don't know for sure.  I'm a leopard.  Would you like to see?" she asked, slowly and carefully, watching him.

He was standing up, and she was still seated on the floor.  Really, with what was coming, she thought that was for the best.  She'd look less threatening from the floor, and fortunately, she had a LOT of leopard blood in her, so she didn't have to shift completely to show him, but he still might freak out.  "Just remember, don't run into the living room.  Wes would NOT react well to that, and I still need to explain why that's a problem for you," she warned him, and then she took a deep breath and braced herself for him freaking out before looking back up at him and letting her eyes....brighten.  She knew that her normally warm brown eyes were nice, but they were normal.  Leopards didn't have brown eyes, but gold, and she could let that slip.  It was subtle, but with eye contact, people didn't often miss it.  She proceeded by raising her hand, holding it out to him almost like she wanted a hand up, and letting spotted fur slide over the top of her arm, with a paler, more white color sweeping the underside of her wrist and arm.  She did this on stage fairly often, exercising control over where she showed off fur, and it seemed like a nice trick to people who didn't realize what it was.  Here, there were no fancy lights or special effects.  It was just her and Josh.

"I'm not lying to you, Josh," she told him, and she smiled to show off canines that weren't quite feline yet, but weren't human.  She was ready to reverse it all in a second if necessary.  "Please don't freak out." 

He laughed, something like a high-pitched giggle. It was his 'nervous' laugh, and it made him sound like a hyena. In the living room, Mel smiled to Drew. "Must be playing nice," she said, then rested her head against him as the three of them stared at her television watching a re-run of Family Guy. Oh, Josh would have paid a lot of money to be able to watch Family Guy with them, on the floor by the TV instead of at the end of the hallway with Aimee right about now.

When she held her hand out, he reached down instinctively, to take it, to help her up, because that's the sort of thing he did. He was surprised to find that she didn't actually place her hand in his, and closed his eyes tightly, reopening them very wide to make sure he was seeing correctly. Fur? Fur! All over her arm! It was gone before he had a chance to touch it, to make sure it hadn't been some sort of optical fail on behalf of his eyes.

Speaking of eyes, hers were gold. Hadn't they been brown a second ago? "Aimee, what..." he said. He trailed off as she smiled, those large canines exposing themselves, presenting her as something a little more unique than just a pretty stripper who happened to be smart on the side. Josh slid back down the wall, unable to really say anything on behalf of himself besides, "Oh shit."

After a few long moments of silence, all he could say was, "So are you all cats? I mean, if Wes is a lion, which..." he trailed off. He always seemed to put himself in charge of things, and he did hit quite hard.. was it so hard to believe? He looked back at Aimee after shaking his head, trying to clear the madness away. "Is Melisande a cat, too?"

Wut.

Drew blinked from his place on the couch, where he'd been starting to slip off into sleep and kept fighting the feeling just to watch the show and be conscious around Melisande and Wes, and actually pushed himself into something more closely resembling an upright position, trying to see the hallway.  He'd heard that laugh, and that was totally Drew's best friend over there.  He knew that meant Josh was feeling nervous, because that just wasn't how he laughed otherwise.  That was an 'oh my god, am I going to die here?' or a 'holy fucking shit, this is fucked up' sort of laugh.  It was what Josh threw out there when a situation was just so ridiculous that he couldn't do anything but laugh.

But...he was in the hall with Aimee.....

Drew blinked again, looking at Wes, then Melisande.  What....?

Aimee didn't know that the laugh was one he made only when he was extremely nervous, but it was unexpected and kind of cute coming out of a guy who was supposed to be all macho and SWAT.  She laughed in return, mostly in relief, though it faded into just a smile very quickly as she watched him slide down the wall, asking questions that made it clear that he believed her now.

Excellent.  They were moving along rather well.

She winced when he asked about Melisande, but she wasn't going to lie.  "Melisande was human until the yelling started outside.  I freaked out because Wes is upset and made a decision regarding Melisande, Drew and you.  The vampires who run the slave trade can take any human they want off the street with no consequences, but there are rules regarding shapeshifters.  They can't just take them, which means that Wes and I are safe.  The three of you weren't, and Wes has decided to fix that.  He infected Melisande when he cut her hand, so she's going to be a lion.  He wants to infect you and Drew," she informed him, back to full serious mode.  No smiles. 

"If you've seen animal planet and know what male lions get like together, imagine the three of you in a room together if you're all lions.  Personally, I don't see that as being a good thing, and I'm afraid Wes really isn't offering this as much of a choice.  I think he'd rather you be mad at him than end up as a vampire's plaything, and I can't say I disagree as much as I'd like to.  Josh, they do horrible things.  You have no idea how lucky we are that Drew was dropped back in that alley in the condition he was in," she told him, and there was something in her voice that was pleading with him to understand how bad this was.  "He could have been hurt very badly, but they can do things to your mind that are irreversible.  Wes is afraid that this is going to lead to worse things, and I'm not going to disagree with him because I've heard about it happening, especially lately."

It didn't take much anymore.

"I -- what?" he asked. He'd started to say something, but Aimee went truckin' right along again, and he waved his hands out in front of him to signal her to slow down. "Wesley infected her?" he asked, his voice a hiss. "That sounds so... unsanitary. How? And, Drew is gonna be pi-i-ssed," he added, eyes wide, his own expressive tone coming in, even in the quiet voice he was using.

"And what do you mean, he wants to change us? I don't want to be a cat. Drew probably doesn't, either, even if Melisande is, though I can't say I speak for him one-hundred percent, because I bet if she asked him to, he might reconsider. Me, I'm kind of happy being a human," he said. He scooted a little away from Aimee, like he didn't quite... like the idea of where this was going.

The vampire slave thing, that hadn't even set in yet. He wasn't ready to try and pull that one apart in his brain, so he focused on the animal thing. Aimee had her hands full if she thought she was going to infect him, or anyone else for that matter. Josh glanced down the hallway, where he could see Wes' profile as the man laughed at the television. He narrowed his eyes, and put together a game plan of how he could take him if he needed to. He could get out that door. He could.

He looked back at Aimee. Did she know he was going to run? He sat still for a few more minutes, and then jumped up. He was OUT!

She would have given him more time with the information, instead of truckin' right along, but she had the feeling she had a limited amount of time before he freaked, and she was going to get as much in as she could.  He also confirmed what she'd already guessed about Drew, and that he was going to be PISSED when he found out what Melisande had done.

She pretty much guessed that Drew wasn't going to be cool with being a cat, either.  There wasn't a whole lot of choice to be had, though.

Yep, there he went.

He told her he was happy being a human, and she sighed, not surprised.  She preferred to have humans be humans, personally.  She'd never infected anyone, and had never intended to, but this?  "Josh, I know, believe me, I kno--"

AND, HE'S OFF!

Well, he thought he was.  He'd forgotten one important thing, though.  Aimee = cat.  Cats = fast.  She had a hand around his ankle so fast that there was no way he was stopping before he bit carpet, and she was on him immediately after.  She didn't weigh enough to really pose a threat, but sitting on his back was the best option she had.  If he tried to fight her, she was going to be MAD.

"Stop!  Are you crazy?!  If you run out there, Wes is going to punch you again, and he's bleeding!  All he has to do is draw blood on you, and you're going to be stuck as a lion!" she explained quickly, panicking just a little.  She was trying to stop this, but he wasn't exactly cooperating.  "Listen, if you get infected by Wes, things are going to get bad, that's what I'm trying to tell you!  He's not going to let you stay human because he doesn't want some vampire to turn you into a whimpering pet, and the only other choice you really have is leopard.  I'm not going to force you, because I don't think that's fair, but Wes will, and you're not going to be able to stop him."

Drew had been settling back down, assuming that the lack of further noises meant that Josh was alright.  That was weird, but maybe he was so tired that he was imagining things.  He settled down again, back into the show, and ended up back to what he'd been doing before: starting to slip off into sleep, and trying to keep himself awake.

Then, he heard a noise that he definitely thought sounded like a body impacting the floor, and he was sitting up again, staring at the hallway, then back to looking between Melisande and Wes.  This one, he wasn't so sure about ignoring.

"Tell me y'all heard that.  I'm not hearin' thangs, that was definitely there!" he told them, eyes wide but definitely a little dazed.  He needed sleep, but he'd heard that.  Something was going on.  "Ain't one of y'all gonna go see what the hell's goin' on?"

WHAM.

"Oooh," he moaned. "If I'd have known eating carpet would be so painful I'd have never tried it," he managed, the horribly off-colour remark breaking the silence of his fall. He openly hoped it offended Aimee, with what she'd just done. "I think I bit my lip when I fell -- yep, I'm bleeding. A-gain," he huffed. He laid his head down while Aimee balanced on top of him, not even bothering to swat at her.

"I'm not as crazy as the catwoman who just pulled my feet out from underneath me," he hissed angrily. "Wes isn't going to force me anything, because I'll rearrange his face if he comes near me," Josh snapped.

"G'damn, Drew. I'll check. Happy?" Wesley said. He stood up and thump-thumped across the apartment floor and stuck his head down the darkened hallway. He didn't see anything for a second, so instead of turning on the light, he just allowed himself to slip a little. Ah. "You kids play nice," he said. To Josh it would mean one thing, to Aimee, another.

"It's nothin'. Aimee and Josh were back there messin' around on Mel's computer, Josh stood up to fast, tripped, busted his ass. You know he's about as graceful as a three-legged dog," he said, sitting back down on the sofa so harshly it made the whole thing jump.

"Holy shit, did you see his eyes?" Josh exclaimed. "They were shiny! Shiny! Like a cat!"

The boy can be taught.

She blinked at his joke about eating carpet, actually amazed at the switch, and just stared at him as he continued about bleeding, again.  "Josh, I'm sorry!  I didn't mean to hurt you!" she told him quickly, and then he was threatening Wes and a moment later the lion was peeking into the hallway, and Aimee saw his eyes shine, as well.

Play nice. 

Her own eyes flashed at that, some temper showing through because this mess was HIS FAULT, but she didn't comment.  She had to bite back any growling she might have wanted, mostly because she wasn't going to flip Josh out worse, and Wes didn't hang around, anyway. 

Josh had noticed his eyes.

She actually facepalmed, and simply because there was NO WAY of responding to that without it.  "Yes, I saw his eyes.  I told you!  You rearranging his face is a real joke, by the way.  Do you know the kind of damage a lion can take?  He could tear you apart if he wanted, and realistically, I probably could, too," she pointed out, just a little irritably.  "Humans are weak, especially unarmed, and you're no match for most of what's out there.  The only thing keeping you safe this long was your ignorance, and Drew still managed to get nabbed."

She gave a shove towards the middle of his back, not hard, but aggressive enough to demonstrate her growing impatience.  "You need to decide if you want to go out there and get completely laid out again by Wes, who is going to make you a lion if he does that and is probably going to have to do the same thing to poor Drew, who still doesn't know what's happening, or if you're going to stop acting like a baby and let me make you a leopard.  I promise I won't be mean about it, and I won't punch you," she assured him, and she knew it wasn't going to make things much better, but she was trying.  That was pretty much what his choice was, though.

Drew stayed sitting up while Wes went to see what was going on, mostly because he was worried he'd conk out if he didn't, and he wasn't so sure he believed it when Wes explained what had happened.  That didn't make sense, and he knew Josh.

Damn it.  He was being paranoid again.  He needed sleep.

He fixed Wes with his best paranoid look, one that clearly said he wasn't buying that line of bullshit, but really, it didn't matter.  He settled back down, because he wasn't going to do anything about it.  Even if he tried, he wouldn't have even made it off the couch before Wes had him down and out, and he'd have been useless even if he got as far as Josh.  He knew he was lost on this one.

Sleep.  Win.

"And what if I don't want to be either?" he challenged. He made an 'umph' noise at the shove, but it really didn't hurt. Still, she was pretty strong for her size, Josh had to admit it. He guessed being a leopard made you stronger - and then she was explaining about how Wesley could really do damage, blah blah blah.

"Aimee, I've been friends with the guy for a few years now. Why would he want to hurt me?" he demanded. "We're tryin' to protect eachother here, not ruin eachother's lives. Come on." He still didn't really think about what Wesley had done to Melisande, but mostly because she didn't fit into the equation - it was Wes, Josh, and Drew. Drew, Josh, and Wes. Mel was a nice addition for Drew, but she didn't really mean a shit to Josh when it came down to it. He had more important things to worry about.

"Get off me," he demanded. "I don't wanna be a leopard, and I don't wanna be a lion. I wanna go home and get some fucking sleep," he snapped. He was growing irritable.

WHY did she promise not to punch him?!  WHY?!

Stupid, stupid, stupid!  She should have never said that, because punching him would really be the easiest, quickest way of dealing with this, and he was frustrating her enough that it might even be satisfying.  Why wouldn't he just listen and accept that she was trying to help him?

"You're asking me to explain the inner workings of the brain of a man I've only known a few hours and have already physically struck, which is NOT something I make it a habit of doing," she informed him irritably, getting impatient with the understanding that he wasn't going to agree, and she had to make a rash decision of her own.  Damn Wes!  If Josh was still human when he walked out there, would Wes leave him alone long enough for it all to sink in, or would he take care of it himself?  The last thing she wanted was to go through all this, let him go, and then have Wes go all HULK SMASH on him when he left the hallway.

That would be useless and frustrating.

"As far as I can tell, he thinks he's protecting you guys by making you into shifters.  It's what he did to Melisande, and I could kill him for it, but he did it to protect her and he hardly knows her.  He'd do it to the two of you in a second," she said, AGAIN, but it wasn't getting through as far as she could tell.  "You don't get that choice.  It's leopard or lion, so grow up and choose."

She wasn't getting off of him until he chose.

"No," he said. He didn't raise his voice much, but the irritation had given way to anger by this point. He was ready for Aimee to be off of him, and it was only his morals holding him from trying to pitch her into the wall. His morals would wear thin, eventually, eroded by his increasing anger, if this tired conversation kept going around in circles.

"I don't want to be either. I'm going to get up, and I'm going to go home, and neither you nor Wesley is going to get to have any say in that matter. Get off me," he said. He meant it. He was done screwing around. He liked Aimee, and he was really trying, but this was all too much for him to swallow at the moment, and he needed to be alone and think. He might even have a cigarette.

"Now," he said, voice raising significantly. Josh was pretty adorable when he was being amicable and comfortable, but when he wanted to, he could be intimidating. He was a decorated Marine sniper, a decorated police officer, and above all, a fairly aggressive individual when push came to shove. Right now, he was being pushed, and he was about ten seconds away from shoving back.

Well, this definitely wasn't going according to plan.  Josh was supposed to accept the fact that she was doing him a favor and trying not to make him suffer, understand the bad situation, and be an adult about it.  Instead, he was acting like a petulant child who didn't want to eat his green beans.

"Josh, you're making this more ridiculous than it has to be," she pointed out, just as irritably, but she took a deep breath and considered the situation.  This was going to get violent if she refused, and she wasn't quite ready to just attack him.  That really wasn't her style.

Letting Wes attack him wasn't an option either, though.  "Fine, I'll get up on one condition.  Don't try to leave the apartment, because that'll set Wes on you.  As long as you don't try to leave immediately, maybe we can talk him down from his ultimatum, okay?" she asked, trying to compromise.  She really didn't think it was right to force Josh out of his humanity, but this situation wasn't exactly one she was in control of.  She hoped he didn't just try to flip her, either, or it was going to get bad.  She could be hurt, and it WOULD hurt if he did something to her, but she'd be on him in seconds.  She didn't want that.

"Okay," he said. The gears in his head were already turning, twisting, doing their Joshua thing. He was good at getting out of sticky situations, and this was about the worst he'd been in for a long time. It wasn't quite like bombs over Baghdad, but it was close to his heart - it involved people he cared about, for one, and the problem now seemed to center directly around his unwillingness to conform to something they all thought best for him. That was the kicker.

He got up slowly when she finally got off of him, and he held out a hand to pull her up. For someone who had just snatched him with so much force, she was as light as a feather, as her frame would dictate. He was... thoroughly perplexed by her, in many ways. Pretty, dangerous. Bad combination, but typical of a woman. He didn't smile, though he almost wanted to at the thought. Aimee was proving to be anything but typical. It was too bad she had a boyfriend - she seemed like just the right amount of trouble for Josh, even if this time he'd bitten off more than he could chew - so to speak.

He walked down the hallway, making a sharp right turn as Wes glanced at him. "Going for a smoke," he said. He snatched a pack of cigarettes on the counter - Melisande didn't smoke, but she'd pointed to them, saying something about Nikki leaving them there. Figured. More shapeshifter nonsense.

He went out onto the balcony, closing the sliding door behind him softly, though leaving it open just a hair to hear what was going on, and lit one up. He didn't even really inhale it, because he was biding his time out.

"Well, now that the room's free," Melisande muttered to herself, though she knew damn good and well Josh and Aimee had been squabbling in the hallway the whole time.. "Hey, Drew," she whispered. She got something of a, "Mm?" response from him, and slid off of the couch.  "C'mon. Bed, let's go."

It didn't take much. He was up and moving, slowly but surely, and she guided him down the hallway to the room. She shut the door with a click, and flicked the lock on it. No chances.

Once more, Aimee found herself seated on the floor besides him as he agreed and then got up, but she wasn't really expecting the hand up.  She accepted it, being lifted to her feet as easily as if she weighed nothing, which obviously wasn't true, but she'd thought he'd have been too angry with her for that.  It was nice to see that wasn't the case.  He wasn't smiling or anything of the sort, however, which was enough to get the point across.  He wasn't pleased.

"Thank you," she told him anyway, following him down the hallway with enough room not to crowd him, but close enough that if he'd bolted for the door, she could try to get to him before Wes did.  Fortunately, he banked for the counter instead, saying he wanted a smoke.  Good, at least he wasn't trying to bolt.  Even so, she was going to be watching him, just in case.  He'd agreed to staying pretty easily, which he had to know meant that they still intended to infect him.

Drew had already been pretty out of it by the time Josh came back in and then went off to the balcony for a cigarette, so he didn't get the opportunity to see his best friend's new shiner or the results of eating carpet.  He also didn't get to see his foul mood, which would have tipped him off to something being messed up.

No, Melisande woke him up, and the most anyone was getting out of him right then was his movement in the direction of the bedroom and more sleep.  He was starting to drift off again by the time he even hit the bed, so he didn't even notice Melisande locking the door.  Details he normally would have puzzled over, and they were completely lost to him.  Poor Drew.  At least he couldn't worry about everything.

"Well, that could have gone better," Aimee sighed once Melisande had Drew down the hall and Josh was on the balcony.  She'd noticed that the door wasn't completely shut, but she'd expected something like that.  She'd have done the same thing.  "You're not changing your mind, are you?"

Wesley glanced up at her, sighing a little. "No," he said softly. "Unfortunately. I know you were hoping I would. We can't risk it. For all we know, they dropped Drew off and they're waiting, watching - waiting for one of us to fuck up." He squeezed his eyes shut briefly, like he head a headache, and opened them again, looking back at the floor, at nothing. The television was off and the light was on, and the room was quiet.

"He comes back in, and one of us is doing something. If it won't be you, it'll be me. I'll destroy our friendship if it means keeping him alive, Aimee." He paused. "You know, I'm not a bad guy," he said, making an effort to believe it himself. "I just... I'll do bad things for the greater good. Everyone in this apartment can hate me tomorrow, but if what I do keeps them alive, then they can hate me to their hearts content. I'll be fine."

Josh's shoulders rocked a little in silent laughter. Who knew Wesley was such a martyr? He made a mental note to kick the shit out of him later, if he could find a way to. For now, though, business was going to continue as normal. He waited until they were good and occupied in their conversation, and he loved Wes for sucking Aimee in to one of those "am I a good person" debates he knew she would eat up given her current mood.

Silently, he flicked his cigarette off of the balcony, and glanced back. Thank God Melisande had some horribly vision-obstructing blinds in the way, or he'd never be able to get away with what he was about to do. Effortlessly, he swung himself up and over the rail, dropping down almost gracefully, so that his hands were hanging at the base of the balcony. He dangled his feet for a minute, searching for the railing of the balcony below him, and found it after a heart-stopping second where his toes didn't touch anything but air. Long way down, that.

He got his balance - thank fuck it was a wide rail he'd planted his feet on - and dropped down, completely removing himself from Melisande's balcony. From his new vantage point, he booked it over two more balconies, and then took a quick leap to the fire escape. As agile as Wesley had been breaking into his apartment, Josh could be breaking out of Melisande's. He of course, had to apply way more effort and concentration, but finally he was down on the ground with the sound of two feet firmly hitting wet pavement.

He dipped around the corner of the building and took off down the street. "Catch me now, bitches," he laughed, though it was an angry sort of 'HUH' laugh. He wasn't pleased, not at all.

This was all nice and dramatic on Wes' end, and Aimee understood what he was thinking, but she still thought he was jumping the gun and being a little outrageous.  There were ways around ruining his friendship and all this mess.  Personally, she wasn't above calling Marius up and having him scare the living hell out of Josh.  There was nothing Josh could do to hurt Marius, and the vampire was trustworthy enough to be allowed to scare the daylights out of the guy.

Once he saw how ridiculously easy it was for a vampire to totally pwn him, maybe he'd reconsider, especially if he got to see someone of Aimee's size deal with Marius.  She wouldn't mind, and she'd been wanting to push the vampire around for awhile.  She was all for aggressive examples.

She had no idea what Josh had coming.

"Oh, stop that!  I don't want to hear all this, 'am I a bad person' nonsense!  I think you're being an ass and jumping the gun, but if you're going to be stubborn about it, then you're going to just have to deal with it.  I can call Marius and get him to come scare Josh if you want, but I still say you should let them choose," she told him, and yes, she'd noticed that Josh had vanished.  Naturally, that didn't mean he'd jumped off the balcony, since they'd been out of sight when Wes infected Melisande, but she noticed.  She just didn't say anything immediately.

It wasn't like she was completely against the idea of Josh getting away, despite trying to convince him to cooperate.  As long as Wes didn't catch him and infect him, she wished him well.

As always, Jared didn't have the slightest idea what he was walking into.  He was hungry, didn't feel like catching some pretty lady that he'd have to liquor up, and the dude he saw coming said something to the effect of 'catch me now, bitches' before running.

As far as he was concerned, that demanded his attention.

He positioned himself in a dark alley where the man had to pass, which was easy given the fact that Josh was already headed in his direction, and it was child's play from there.  YOINK!

He threw an arm out and would have totally clotheslined the dude if he hadn't gotten a grip on him at the same time to avoid him landing on his back and contemplating the sky.  Instead, he whipped him around and bounced him off the alley wall.  Best to avoid giving him a good look at who was attacking him.  "Looks like I caught you, bitch," he snickered as he approached, grabbing the dude and steadying him against the wall.  He wasn't lingering over this one.  That always got bad.

"Maybe I am. One more reason why we don't need more lions running around," he said, finally laughing a little. The fact that the tiny woman insisted on calling him names and hitting him made him want to laugh, but up until this point, he'd been too wound up to do it. Now he did laugh, though, shaking his head a little. "There have to be other alternatives. Don't you know any other shifters? Maybe he just doesn't want to be a cat." He shrugged a little. "Personally, I don't see why. We're pretty much cooler than anything else out there. I mean, he could get infected by, I don't know, a sparrow tomorrow. Could you imagine how pleased he'd be, then? I might actually take the risk, considering the alternative. Josh, a sparrow."

If only he'd known Church.

"I'm going to be hearing it from them for a long time. Wait until my brother finds out. Then I'll catch it from both ends, and he's still human. He'll fool you, though," he laughed. "I'm almost relieved Drew is in Mel's care, though. She'll think long and hard about whatever she does before she does it. Patience is a virtue I lack."

He stopped talking suddenly, and tilted his head. He craned around to look at the balcony. He sniffed a little.

"Son of a BITCH!"

All of that talk of trying to calm down went out the window, and Wesley leaped up and was out of the apartment before Aimee could have even stopped him. He thundered down the stairwell, having zero time for elevators, and busted out into the street. It was dark, there was no traffic. He was livid. He allowed himself to slip into form just enough to scent Josh out, which wasn't hard, considering he knew the smell like he knew his own. His eyes were positively amber now as he stalked after Josh's trail at a stupidly fast pace.

All thoughts of making his friend into an animal were gone, replaced only by the very realistic idea that the vampires who'd attacked Drew were waiting around for something to give, for one of them to pop up again. Damn Josh for being so human!

Josh was hoooome free. He felt bad about leaving Drew, but when he had the word of Aimee that Melisande was watching him, he felt like it would be a nice time to step out and collect his brain off the sidewalk. He needed to get his life out of the jaws of the two big cats and try to get it sorted before he could come to any kind of conclusion - as it stood, he was about as warmed up to the idea of being a cat as Hitler was of Anne Frank, which is to say, not very much.

He didn't have time to think about much besides that, though, because he was suddenly down, up, and without breath. The wind got knocked out of him pretty fiercely, not to mention his gravity comprehension was suddenly very shaken up. He'd gone backwards, and then been picked up and slammed into a wall, and was now being accosted by a very menacing looking man that.. Josh narrowed his eyes, trying to force air back into his lungs.

Jared actually wasn't so menacing at all. He looked sort of like a car jacker or a punk, but not a big Mafia boss. Not only that, but he was maybe half as built as Josh, and Josh was SWAT, so he was pretty tough. Why were his feet dangling above the ground?

"What... the fuck..." he wheezed. Did this kid really have any idea he had a cop pinned against a wall? Josh didn't recognize his face, so it couldn't have been that personal, could it have?

A cop?  HA!  Even better. 

Wait.  Jared was pretty new when it came to the whole vampire mind-reading bit, but he was getting pretty good at it, and this was...wow.  Did he really have the luck to snag a guy out of this kind of a situation?  "Dude, you should have listened to your friends.  Vampires don't give a shit if you're a cop," he pointed out, holding the guy back.  He was SWAT and thought he was badass.  Not good for cooperation.

Normally, Jared wouldn't have hesitated from there.  He'd have buried teeth into the man's throat and finished up fast, but he smelled something.  Actually, it was similar to one of the scents coming off the human, but it wasn't quite right.  He smelled cats, two different kinds, and this new scent was another of the cats.  Same kind, but different animal.

Oh, shit.  He didn't want to deal with shifters, especially big ones, not tonight.

Maybe it'd leave him alone long enough to eat.

Yeah, right.

Nick actually had the good fortune to end up happening upon this situation, which was only proof of that whole 'it's a small world' concept.  He smelled lion, though not incredibly strongly, in the area, and ended up glancing into the alley to see where it was coming from.  He found a man being pinned to the wall by another man who was built well, but not well enough for the job at hand.  Pretty much guaranteed that it was a vamp, especially given their positioning.  He'd bet vampire, and if that wasn't the case, his bad.

Nope, definitely vampire.

The dark-haired attacker lunged forward, obviously to take a chunk out of the man he had pinned to the wall, and Nick was on him in seconds.  He hit the vamp like a train, effectively tearing him away from the human (yes, human, even though he had a whiff of lion about him, with even more leopard in there), and shifted as soon as he was clear of the human.  No sense in risking claws and teeth around someone who couldn't heal.  The guy was probably going to have a few new hurts just from the vampire.

Yeah, the shifter wasn't going to let him eat.  He hated that shit.  Fucking assholes, interrupting all the time.

Oh, FUCK. 

"Oh, you fucking SUCK!" he hissed, scrambling back as the man who'd knocked him sprawling changed form.  A fucking lion.  A LION.  Holy hell, that fucker was big.  BIG.  He didn't know lions were that big, but were they really?  Was it just big because it was a shifter, or because lions were that big?  Damn, he had no idea, but he wasn't hanging around for this one.  "Fuck that, you can have him!"

He still had to dodge claws and teeth, something he wasn't entirely successful with, before he could BAMF out of there.  Fuck that, FUCK THAT.  LIONS. 

Josh struggled against the vampire, but what he said made his head spin. Listened to his friends? What? Josh suddenly realized that he'd been thinking about what had just happened, right then, and that Wesley and Aimee might have been right. He didn't have time to react, though, because it looked like Wesley had this under control... question mark.

Josh fell to his knees, and immediately backed up into the alley further, which he knew was a dumb decision on his own part. The vampire was gone - literally gone - just like that. Nowhere to be found, not a trace, no footsteps running in the distance - nothing, nil, nada, zip, zilch, gone. Josh blinked rapidly, and then turned to look at Wesley.

"Okay man. You were right. You were totally right," he said, holding his hands up. "But Wes, I don't know that I want to be a lion just yet. I mean, think about it, fucking lions, man. How am I going to figure out what the hell is going on, what I do, where to go from there?" He was babbling, but he was like... That had totally just blown his mind.

Wesley heard the scuffle, and rounded the corner just in time to see a vampire popping off into the wind. His jaw nearly dropped at the sight of another lion, though, and his hackles raised. He could feel fur at the back of his neck, though he couldn't quite see his own eyes bleed from the hazel blue into straight gold. Instinctively, he lowered himself a little, ready to pounce on his own.

"Josh," he said, his voice very firm. "I'm over here."

The scent of the other lion was completely unfamiliar to him, and he all but ached at the idea of attacking. He reached out and snatched Josh behind him. "Time for 'I told you so' is later, buddy. For now, stay here," he said, placing him behind him. "This might get ugly," he added, his voice barely audible; he was saying it to himself, really, as he took another step forward.

What the hell was this?  Did that guy just call him Wes, and then start babbling about being a lion?  Could it possibly be the same Wes he'd known?  Bishop?  No way.

Yes way.  Yes, this guy, Josh, was talking about Wesley Bishop, and that much was obvious by the sudden appearance of Nick's old military buddy.  Small world.  This was NOT good, though.  Besides Bishop's reaction, all aggression, Nick could smell him.  That was the lion he smelled.  Bishop was a lion.

FUCK.

Nick knew what that meant.  It was his fault.  Damn it. 

Letting it get ugly was the last thing he wanted right then, which was fortunate, since he could have gone for a fight.  He could still smell the vampire's blood on the air and his claws, but fighting with Wes wasn't a good thing.  Only if he had to, and he could shift in a hurry if the situation called for it, so he flicked his tail again, fixing the other lion with his golden eyes, and returned to his human form.

"Surprise.  You even think about getting ugly on me, and I'll kick your ass, Bishop," he warned, grinning as he did so.  "You can relax, I've already eaten, so your friend is safe."

From behind Wesley, an audible sound between relief and irritation was heard as Joshua paced in the background, but Wesley was all stunned all over again. "LeCroix?" he asked. Of course. It all made sense now. He thought back to the incident, all the blood, and just shook his head, amazed.

"Well, I'll be damned," he trailed. His surprise was clouded by a smile, and it was a happy sort of smile. "Nick," he said again, and this time laughter was following his words. Relief, happiness, and good memories were certainly what the doctor ordered this time. "You always show up at just the right possible moment. How are you, man?" he asked.

The tension was gone - even for a male lion, Wesley could override that small attack command when it came to Nick. After all, he'd sort of 'fathered' him, so there was a deep respect there that simply wouldn't be shaken by primal urges. He extended his hand, and did the manly "shake/hug" thing guys do, with the one armed pat and the chest bump.

"Josh, it's cool. This is Nick LeCroix. He was with me when I got exploded - kind of like you and Drew, except... I got more than a medal for my effort." He motioned for Josh to come over, which he did, gloomy as ever.

"How's it goin? Thanks for ah, yeah, that," he said, pointing behind him at the nothingness where Jared had vanished. "It seems like Aimee was right, after all. Being a human is just one step away from being splattered." He frowned. He wasn't happy with his reality right now.

Nick's grin only widened at Wes' obvious shock, and he pretty much stood there looking smug and pleased with himself as Wes went from shock to relief and happiness, even with the lion fight-vibes.  Personally, Nick wasn't worried.  He was top-cat, when it came to lions anyway, and he wasn't giving that up.  Everyone else could just deal.

"Glad to have been of help, and good to meet you, Josh," he responded smoothly, his grin fading just a touch at the edges to give Josh a look that clearly said he agreed about humans getting splattered, and hadn't forgotten the bit about Josh being a lion.  "I'm doing well for myself, but we have time to catch up when we're not lingering at the site of a vamp attack.  I doubt the little shit will be back after the chunk I took out of him, but you never know with them.  You sound like you have a mess on your hands."

Actually, it sounded like more than just a mess.  Who was Aimee, and what exactly was going on?  Naturally, Wes didn't have to tell him, but he'd help wherever he could.  "Need a hand?"

"If it's all the same, I'd also like to vacate the premises. I'm not really too keen on staying anywhere where someone just tried to, ah, eat my face off," he said, holding his hand up a little and making a face. He looked at Wesley, mostly, because he was waiting for what his friend was looking to do. Josh was a leader, but here it seemed like a lost cause, so he picked familiarity.

"Yes, I think we do," he said, glad that Nick had offered. He felt more and more relieved the longer he thought about it, and nodded. "The apartment is back this way. Aimee's waiting, I'm sure, with a frying pan by the door if I bring you back in with any scratches or bites on you, so please don't alarm her?" he asked Josh.

"Oh, you be my guest and go through that door first. She already ripped my leg out from underneath me, I'm scared to see how hard she can swing kitchen cookery," he muttered. He was too tired to be angry at this point. He just went along with them, walking in the front first, then falling back in step with Wesley and Nick. With all of the undead popping up, he didn't really feel like being too far ahead or behind, just in case.

Josh felt like a little girl. He hated it.

Nick nodded and smirked with Wes' agreement that they needed help, and went with them without question, just listening to them speak.  Aimee was mentioned again, which naturally made him wonder who she was.  He'd smelled leopard on Josh, and he said she ripped his leg out from underneath him, so that might make sense. 

"Is Aimee the leopard you both reek of?" he asked, and he didn't even mean it in a bad way.  Hell, he reeked of hyena, and he knew it and totally didn't care.  It was a scent he'd come to adore, compliments of Skye.  "Actually, why don't you fill me in on what the mess is before we get up to that apartment and the woman with the frying pans?"

He'd appreciate that, especially if he could potentially find himself being attacked with one of them, or if there might be vampires coming out of the woodworks after Wes' human friend.  If he was going to be bleeding for someone, he wanted to know why.

Wesley walked at a brisk pace, because he was eager to get back under cover. Drew being kidnapped by a vampire, and then Josh bolting out of the apartment and getting grabbed by one? It was coincidental in truth, but he didn't know that, and so he thought it best to get back to the apartment and out of the prying eyes of the outside world as fast as possible. While he walked, he gave Nick everything he knew, from beginning to end, including what he'd done to Melisande.

Josh had actually stopped in his tracks at that point, saying something to him about having no idea Aimee had been that serious. Wesley only gave him a sort of grim smile, and shrugged. "What else can I say? I acted, I reacted. You know who I am. I went for the quickest solution. Even Aimee agreed, we'd have talked ourselves around in a circle all night and come to the same conclusion." He shrugged. "It doesn't take away the... immorality of what I've done, but really, I'm not a man of many of those, so I'd like to say I did it for the best."

Josh had fallen back into silence after that, sulking in his own way. When they got to the apartment, Wes nodded to Nick. "I'll go in first. She's probably hoping to hit me, anyways." With that, he opened the door. "Ho-oney, I'm ho-ome," he said, though not loud enough to wake up Melisande and Drew, not that he could have if he tried. They were both out cold.

"I brought company, and no, Joshua is not a lion," he said firmly. It didn't matter. He heard the whiffing noise of a spatula right before it connected with his shoulder.

Well.  Wesley's explanation of the entire situation certainly put everything into perspective, and Nick couldn't say he completely disagreed with it all.  He made it clear that he was glad Wes didn't go off and make a whole pride of male lions, however, considering how stupid that would be.  He definitely didn't mind the female, but he was going to have to talk her out of making her boyfriend into a lion.  He didn't need to deal with that, especially once Jaime found out there were a zillion male lions running around all of a sudden.  Jaime would be likely to go Animal Planet on their asses, and there wouldn't be a whole lot Nick could do about it.  He was definitely in favor of the leopard infecting the other two if it was going to be done, and he said so.

Based on what Wes had said about Josh taking off like a little girl, Nick had to wonder what the guy's opinion was currently.  He'd seemed to be accepting of the wisdom of becoming a shifter after getting knocked around by the vampire, but now that he'd had time to recover and think things through, was he still?  He wasn't going to be a lion, Nick was set on that, but there was still Aimee.

Speaking of which, Nick didn't even SEE her until he heard the spatula impact Wes' shoulder.  THAT was impressive.

She honestly couldn't blame Josh for running, especially with how little choice he was getting in the matter, but that didn't mean she was pleased with it, nor was she okay with the way Wes had taken off after him.  She wasn't about to leave Melisande and Drew sleeping and alone at this point, and really?  If Josh got himself infected and blew his whole life up by pissing Wes off, she washed her hands of it.  She couldn't keep driving herself crazy trying to help him.

She'd just drive herself crazy worrying about what was going on in the meantime, and plot what she was going to do to Wes to satisfy her anger and frustration where he was concerned.

That was what lead her to the path of the Spatula Ninja.  It was a metal spatula, one that she was certain she could bend back into place if necessary, instead of breaking in the way that a plastic one would.  'Hoping' to hit him wasn't taking leopard speed and stealth into consideration.  She waited, and as he walked in with that cutesy little announcement, she struck, and she landed a solid hit to his shoulder.

"YOU ASS.  He'd better NOT be!" she told him, grabbing Josh by the arm and practically yanking him into the apartment so she could look him over and get a whiff of him.  "Why does he smell like vampire, and who's the other lion?"

Yeah, she hadn't missed that.

Nick actually busted out laughing at the female's reaction, pretty impressed with the first impression.  She was pretty, wasn't taking shit from the second biggest guy in the room, and totally manhandled Josh.  He liked her.  "You must be Aimee.  I'm Nick LeCroix, one of Wes' old friends.  I came upon your damsel in distress here getting tossed around like a rag doll," he explained easily.

"Fortunately, I chased the bad guy away, and saved the princess so that Wes could have his happy ending."  Ahh, he'd missed Wes.  He had a lot of jokes at his friend's expense to cram into a short period of time if he was going to make up for all he'd missed.

"DAMNIT WOMAN!" he thundered. He swatted at Aimee, knowing full good and well that she was already moving, so his hands impacted air as Aimee squirreled around him to yank Josh by the collar and smell him. He laughed at Joshua's surprised face as she did so, and shrugged when the man looked questioningly to him for answers. Wesley only offered a shrug at her demands.

"Seems like our reverse cat burglar here decided to take a promenade in the city by himself, and Nick had to round him up after he nearly became lunch." He turned his toothy grin towards Josh, as malicious as it was, and raised his brows. "So, you ready to be a leopard, yet, or do you want me to set you out in the dark again so you can have another go. By the way, for as strong as he was, the way Nick describes him vanishing makes me think he's young. That young could be days or years, but still... You think he was powerful, you need to meet some of the vampires that've been around for a few hundred years."

Joshua hung delicately in Aimee's grasp, trying to crane his head backwards and away as she sniffed him. She did look like a cat, then, and he wondered how previously he'd missed it with the way she moved. "That's Nick," he offered, when Wesley quieted down. "He's a friend of Wesley's. Actually, from the story I hear, he's who made Wesley a lion, so..." he trailed off.

Once he started to squirm, he felt the hand unclasp from the collar of his shirt, and he nearly fell backwards, stumbling and swatting at Aimee much like Wesley had previously. "A few weeks, did you say?" he asked. He stammered something unintelligible, and then sort of gave them the o.O stare for a few seconds.

"The ones who run the place you guys keep talking about... How old are they?" He shifted, taking a step back from the three cats to get some breathing room. Nick and Wesley standing in the front of Melisande's apartment made the room seem ridiculously tiny. Josh wasn't a small guy, but seriously. He ran his fingers through his short hair, and waited for responses, confident that he'd get them this time around.

Nick was actually pretty content to just stand around and pretend to blend in with the wall, which obviously wasn't happening.  He was used to it, but for the most part, his input wasn't required.  He'd give it where he felt like it, but he knew when to shut up and just pay attention to what was being said and done around him.  It was a good way to pick up valuable information.  "That vampire was young.  I kill older, stronger ones on a regular basis," he said firmly, very certain about that one.  The vampire had taken too long to vanish, suggesting to him that the kid wasn't used to being able to do it, and he hadn't been willing to fight for his dinner.  Most of them got an ego after awhile, and would have, or would have tried to take Josh with them.  That one had been young.

"Yeah, that wasn't intentional, just a bad situation with a lot of bleeding involved," Nick assured them all when Josh made mention of him being the one to make Wes a lion, and it was the truth.  He and Wes knew it.  Hell, he hadn't even KNOWN that Wes was a lion until today, but he couldn't really say he was surprised.  That was the closest to dying he'd ever gotten, and they'd both bled a lot.  Probably the only reason it hadn't occurred to him that Wes might have been infected sooner was that he hadn't been thinking too well at the time.  Other things stood out more in his mind regarding that situation.

It wasn't one he was going to dwell on, so Josh turning the conversation to Midnight was just fine with him, especially since he was about to be the bearer of bad news.  "Midnight is run by a very brutal, crazy bitch by the name of Jeshickah, and she's at least 800 years old.  She doesn't exactly make her age common knowledge.  I've heard rumors of some leeches in Mayhem that are over 2 and 3,000 years old, but nobody's been able to confirm that.  It's not like finding out a vamp's age is easy, and I don't imagine the ones that are that old are very open about it," he explained.  He almost felt bad for Josh, who'd just been attacked by a young vamp and thought it was impressive.  Now, he got to hear that the REAL threats were insanely old. 

Wes' yelling and swatting was useless, as expected, as was Josh's.  She didn't want to get swatted, and so she wasn't going to unless they got VERY lucky.  Not that it mattered anymore, since she'd gotten the information she'd wanted from her whiff of Josh, and now she was getting an explanation. 

Aimee nodded, taking in the information being given to her rather quickly.  Nick LeCroix, friend of Wesley's, actually the one who infected him.  That explained quite a bit about their dynamics, actually.  Nick walked in, said what he wanted and treated the situation like he'd been there from the start, and Wes didn't question it.  Considering what she knew of lions, she'd have expected more in the way of challenges out of them, but if Nick had been the one to infect Wes, not to mention information she probably wasn't getting about their past, that could explain why they didn't bicker or fight.  Still, it was something to see.

"Even the vampires who work at All Hallows are a century and older.  I think Marius is closer to three, but I'm not sure," she offered to what Nick had already said about Midnight and Mayhem.  "The younger vampires are more numerous, but there are enough running around with a little power behind them to be dangerous."

So, did all this mean that Josh was changing his mind?  She personally would have preferred calling someone she trusted in to scare him, but this situation hadn't gone so badly that she regretted it.  Josh seemed to have needed a scare.

"Eight-hundred?" Josh said, eyes wide with disbelief. When Nick continued that there were some said to be in the thousands, he just closed his mouth and let out a sigh through his nose that emphasized how displeased he was about the current state of affairs. "I don't understand. How do I live for this long and not know about any of this, or at least hear rumours?" he asked. He looked at Wesley, and the glance might have been accusatory, but it was hard to tell.

"And you," he said. Uh-oh, that was the sign that he was about to rant. "How many times have you done shit that Drew and I both asked you about, only for you to make up some bullshit excuse? Uh-huh, now it all makes sense. It's pretty fucked up that if we all got shot up in some crazy bank heist situation, Drew and I would stand a high chance of dying while you could just shake it off and walk away."

It wasn't hard to tell so much after that; Josh's temper was peaking. "This is so fucked up," he repeated two or three times, emphasizing different parts of the phrase each time. He laced his fingers on top of his head, and just... shrugged. He was seething. "I don't even know what to fucking say."

Wesley shifted his weight while Nick spoke, all the while nodding and agreeing; he noticed Aimee pretty much did the same. At least the three of them were all on the same page this time, instead of he and Aimee being in totally different books altogether.

When Joshua started throwing accusations around, though, his eyes nearly popped out of his skull. He took a step forward, putting a finger right in Josh's face, which he knew Josh hated more than anything else; more than dolls. He knew Josh hated being told what to do when it came to times when he was angry, and so it was the one tactic he used effectively and without regard for his friend's feelings, because what he'd said had clearly been over the line.

"You'd better watch it, Silvera," he snapped, that finger about an inch from his face. "You don't fucking know how I got this way to begin with. Did I ever tell you why I got discharged? No? Well, you're going to know, now. Nick and I were stationed overseas, not unlike you and Drew, except when I got two holes the sizes of baseballs blasted into my chest cavity, Nick was there to help me out. I got infected as a result, but he saved my ass, so don't you dare condescend to me about how my chances of survival are any better. A bullet that's well placed is going to do the same amount of damage, no matter what your target is."

He was radiating heat, and he felt that familiar sensation warming over him. It was sun, low drums and the soft scent of rolling grass. It started in his chest, constricting, and then worked its way outward, until his left hand had changed somehow. With a steady warning from Nick -- "Wesley." -- the beast inside of him backed down, and Wesley took his hand out of Josh's face and turned to pace into the living room, stomping heavily as he did so.

He turned finally, and just pointed again. "You have no fucking idea, so you shut your face. Don't you direct your misplaced anger at being out of the loop at me, because all I've ever done is tried to watch your back." There. He was done. He sat down on the couch with a big flop, leaning forward to put his elbows on his knees. Wesley was officially angry.

Aimee couldn't honestly say that she didn't feel horrible for Josh in this situation, but at least he hadn't learned through being grabbed like Drew had.  It could have been much worse for him.  Of course, his temper wasn't something she was entirely prepared for, either, so she was glad that it wasn't directed at her.  She wouldn't have taken it quietly if it was, but she still appreciated it.  People weren't always rational when they were angry, and she really hadn't done anything to deserve getting bitched at.

This was all between Wes and Josh, when it came down to it, and both Aimee and Nick kept quiet right up until Wes started getting scary.  That fight would NOT have been fair, and Aimee actually tensed up, prepared to jump in if she had to in order to keep Josh from being infected by lion.

As it turned out, Aimee didn't have to worry about jumping in, because Nick had it covered.  All he did was say Wes' name as far as everyone in the room could tell, but it was the subtle bits that mattered.  He hadn't moved forward much, but he'd taken a small step in the other lion's direction and he knew how to use his size to get the utmost intimidation factor in.  From there, it was the tone of his voice, firm and authoritative, as well as the slightest note of a growl underneath.  If Wes didn't stand down, he was going to force him to, and Wes didn't want that.  That was clear from his body language and that one word he'd spoken, and the look he got from Aimee alone made it obvious that he'd accomplished what he intended. 

The part of him that was all lion was satisfied with the respect he received, and he'd have been lying if the human part of his brain wasn't in agreement, but the problem with Nick getting aggressive and intimidating was that it made that lion want to play around.  He hadn't gotten to kill the vampire because he'd taken off, and now he wouldn't have minded a tussle, even if he knew it was inconvenient and completely against everything they were trying to do.  That was why he stayed put, and let Wes stomp over to the couch while he cocked an eyebrow up at Josh, as though daring him to keep egging Wes on. 

His stare was interrupted by his phone ringing, which still wouldn't have meant anything, except for who was calling.  He dropped a curse under his breath, aware that he hadn't called Skye to warn her that he'd gotten sidetracked, and turned away from the others slightly to answer it.

"Hey, baby, how're my two sweethearts doing?" he asked, his tone from before COMPLETELY doing a 180.  He paused, obviously listening to Skye on the other end, and the smile that crossed his features was completely out of place in the situation he was currently in.  "Give her a kiss for me, I'm running a little late.  I ran into a vamp and a buddy from the Service, and he's having some issues.  I'm gonna try to help him make sense out of this mess, and then I'll be home."

He hesitated again, listening, and though he was still laughing somewhat, he looked almost like he believed whatever she'd said.  "Don't you dare.  No, missing dinner does NOT mean that I'm on my own tonight!  Come on, baby, save me some!  Fine, yes.  I'll mow the lawn this weekend, promise.  Yeess, I'll do the dishes, too.  Skye!  Fine, pistachio it is.  There'll be dinner left when I get there?  Good.  Yeah, I'll bring Wes around sometime so you can meet him.  Alright, honey, I'll see you two soon.  Bye."

All that for some fish.  Damn. 

When he turned around, he didn't exactly have his intimidation factor back in place, especially given the conversation.  You really couldn't let everyone hear that, then look intensely scary within seconds.  It took some work.

The anger dissipated as Josh and Wesley exchanged glances over Nick's phonecall, and the sudden change of complete demeanor that the man did. No, there would definitely be no way that any scare tactic would work on either of them now, not without the promise of violence hanging closely by. Josh walked to the chair Wesley had inhabited before and sat down not quite so loudly, though he did turn it a little so that he could keep Aimee and Nick in his vision.

"So, the forty-thousand dollar question is, where do we go from here? Because the idea of having to swap blood with someone is kind of gross to me. It isn't that I mind seeing it, but the entire.. infected thing just brings to mind so many nasty ideas." He wrinkled his nose. It seemed like most of his temper had gone away, but that was how he and Wesley were. Separate them to their corners and give them time to cool off, and things were fine again. It was a good dynamic.

"And how am I going to know what to do when I am like one of you? Like, when do I shift? How long does this shit take to work?" He had about a million other questions, but there was no point in asking them all; they'd be there all night if he did. He looked at Aimee, specifically. "Are there any other leopards? I mean, do I like, hang with you guys until I have this figured out? Is this something you really figure out?"

They were perfectly valid questions, if not a little frustrating. Josh was stalling, obviously, but given the fact that his choice in the matter was suddenly gone, he'd like to be at the very least informed.

Aimee positively stared at Nick after the phone call finished, though she recovered fairly quickly.  Given what she'd seen of him, she wouldn't have ever pegged him for that easily pushed around by anyone, but his wife seemed to manage it.  At least, it had sounded like it was his wife.  She must have been quite the woman.

"What?" he demanded, looking from face to face as Josh and Wesley exchanged a funny look and Aimee stared at him for an instant, then he rolled his eyes.  "None of you are married, so I don't want to hear shit out of you."

He meant it.  Whenever Josh and Wes finally settled down, if they could find women that would tolerate them long enough, they'd see.  Wes and Aimee were already bickering almost like they were married, spatula included, so he had a few predictions where Wes' married life was concerned.  He'd definitely see.

Nick really didn't have anything to offer other than swapping blood, so he totally stepped over that question in favor of hitting the others.  "Don't worry, you'll know.  Wes said he infected the girl, Melisande you said her name was?  The infection's probably set in by now, so she'll feel about like she has the flu for awhile, and by the time she recovers, she'll be a lion."

Smiling at Nick's remark about marriage, Aimee pressed on to avoid anything else out of the guy.  It wasn't her business, even if she thought it was kind of cute how sweet he was to his wife.  She wondered if the woman knew how scary he could be when she wasn't around, though.  Probably, and if she were anything like Aimee, she'd have enjoyed knowing the effect she had.  Maybe if they all kept spending time around each other, she'd get to meet Nick's wife.  She thought she'd like that.

"Wellll, technically, swapping blood is how it works.  That doesn't mean we need to use caveman tactics like Wes did, though," she pointed out, giving Wes a 'look'.  "I'd have to stop at home and borrow some lab equipment, but I know I have syringes there.  All it would take would be a little injection, and it'd be done."

That was simple enough, right?  It was the rest that was going to be difficult.  Nick had the infection timeline figured out, which was good.  The two lions would have to help Josh out with that information, because Aimee had been born a leopard, so she didn't really know how long it would take.  Apparently, it took at least a week, since that was how long it took that boy Nero had healed to show marked improvement.  "I don't personally know any leopards outside my family, but I'm sure there are some.  I could help you get the hang of things, if you're worried about that," she offered, smiling in what she hoped would be a reassuring manner.  She didn't want him more nervous than he had to be.  "I'm sure you'll 'figure it out' fast enough, though.  I wouldn't worry about that."

Josh frowned. It sounded gross - and he wasn't squeamish, again, but still, the thought of shooting up someone else's blood was just.. disgusting. "Aimee, honestly, I think I'd rather you punched me in the face." He waited until Wes' high-pitched 'AHA' had been stifled, and when Joshua gave him a Look and felt satisfied he'd shut up for the moment, he looked back up at her.

"Really. I just can't shake the feeling that I'd feel like a guinea pig any other way."

How could you not expect Wesley to laugh at something like that? The notion that it had been exactly what he'd wanted to do the whole time came into play, of course, but he was tickled a fine shade of pink at the idea that Aimee had promised not to hit Josh, and now she might end up doing it after all. It deserved more laughter than he'd been able to choke out, silencing himself and turning away, his hand covering his mouth as he hid his wide smile.

He was thoroughly amused, and it showed.

"Shut up," Josh snapped, giving Wesley another scowl. "I'd rather be hit by her than you. You almost threw my jaw out of socket when you hit me before, thank God you hadn't meant to actually do it or I'd be in the hospital right now." Scowl, scowl, scowl.

Was he serious?!  All she'd gone through to keep Josh from getting beat on more than he had to, and now he'd prefer if she punched him?

...Fine.

She positively GLARED at Wes for his laughing, obviously aware of exactly why he was laughing like that, and she stormed off into the kitchen for a moment.  It occurred to her that it might have been a bad idea, since leaving the three men in the same room together without a female influence to keep them from regressing into cave men didn't appeal to her, but she didn't prefer to just beat something in order to draw blood as Wes had, and she had to be bleeding in order for a punch to do any good.  She ended up grabbing a small paring knife, keeping it out of sight as she returned, and she was quick about what she did.

A quick swipe of the blade over her knuckles, which hurt, mere steps to be up in Josh's face, and she hauled off and nailed him.  In the end, he probably even deserved it, and it had to hurt.  Not as much as Wes, and she'd still held back to avoid doing any serious damage, but she didn't hit like a girl.

Personally, Nick thought the guy was an idiot for telling Aimee to hit him, and that was simply because he knew better.  A quick prick of a syringe would be more comfortable than getting punched, and from Wes' reaction, there was apparently something he was missing about the idea of Aimee punching Josh.  Aimee further encouraged that belief in him when she glared at Wes and stormed off into the kitchen.

Nick thought she was pissed, and refusing to do it.  Boy, was HE wrong.

She was quick, especially since he didn't realized instantly what she was doing, but by the time he saw that blade and the blood, she was already knocking Josh senseless. 

"Oh, shit," he commented, just a little surprised by that turn of events, but he had to give her credit.  That looked like it hurt, and at least there wouldn't be anymore dancing around the subject.

Josh didn't really have time to think or react. One moment, Aimee had been standing there, and then she'd stormed off. He assumed that she didn't want any part of what was going on any further, and he couldn't blame her. He stood up slowly, and turned with a sigh to go after her. "Aimee..." he began. Really, he was having mixed feelings about this, suddenly.

That was all he got. She hit him square in the nose, and with a muffled sort of cry, he fell backwards and into the chair. The momentum, however, was strong - Josh and the chair both landed end-over, and he kicked it from on top of himself before letting out a low grunt of pain. He looked down at his hand, which he'd drawn to his face. His nose, thank fuck, hadn't been broken, but he bet if he'd been moving at any greater rate of speed they'd be taking a ride to the hospital.

"God damn!" he hissed. He squinted as the pain set in, followed shortly by the warm sensation of blood coming out of his nose. He grabbed the overturned chair and used it to pull himself up, and then, literally, stumbled into the kitchen to grab a paper towel.

Wes actually flinched when he heard the hit connect. "You hit him harder than I did," he commented lightly, only moving to further aggravate the situation. He didn't smile, though, but rather readjusted himself on the couch so that he was stretched out, facing Nick and Aimee.

"And then we were one, big, happy family," he said, holding his hands out in a little 'ta-da' motion. He looked pointedly at Nick. "I think we might have it covered from here, but I may need you again for Drew, unless Silvera wants to find a way to infect him when nobody's looking. As much as those two scuffle, it wouldn't surprise me if he did it accidentally-on-purpose." He raised his eyebrows, and then stood, straightening his shirt a little before covering the length of the room to Nick.

"It's really good to see you again, though. I want to meet this wife of yours, considering you were the 'never get married' type when I knew you. She must be amazing, if a little out of her mind, to have tied you down." He smiled, and he was all fun and games now, the serious tone leaving his voice. "Plus, I need to see the baby with my own two eyes to believe it. Are they both lions?" he asked.

Mixed feelings?  Too late!

"I did not!" she argued, looking a little upset by that.  She hadn't meant to hit him that hard!  "You knocked him out cold, and I didn't even break his nose!  Besides, it's what he gets for asking to be hit!"

She was standing by that one.  Josh wouldn't ask to be hit ever again, though she really hadn't meant to knock him over a chair like that.  It DID make her feel bad.  These guys were driving her NUTS!  She never hit people!  "Damn it.  Josh!" she called, following him into the kitchen so she could help him with his nose.  She needed to wrap her hand in something until it healed up, too. 

"Josh, I'm sorry, I really didn't mean to hit you so hard.  Let me see."

Wes wasn't the only one who flinched, but Nick was fine with letting Josh and Aimee figure things out on their own. 

"Having this whole mess again is going to be ridiculous," he pointed out.  It might almost be better if Josh infected his friend in a scuffle instead of going through telling him and making him accept it as they'd done with Josh.  At least if Drew was infected first, he'd have no choice in the matter.  "No male lions, got it?"

Just in case.  He didn't want Wes tempted to just do it himself.  "Make sure the girl knows.  She can't do it, because that's a mess we don't want."  He could just imagine what Jaime would think of a new male in the area.  He was already going to hate Wes.

"Actually, you have to meet her now.  She said so on the phone," he offered with a grin.  He was totally dragging Wes over for dinner.  "No, Skye is actually a hyena, but Nico is a lion, amazingly.  Got it from me," he informed Wes, unable to avoid sounding a little proud.  "Who would've thought, huh?  I actually met her on a job, honestly.  It was the last place either of us expected."

Josh frowned, and then obligingly removed the paper towel so she could see what she'd done. "I'm tired of being beat up," he moaned. "As soon as I'm a leopard, I'm going to beat Wesley's ass. I can't really beat your ass, though. I did ask you to hit me. I didn't think you really would!" he added though, moving away from her to throw the paper towels in the garbage.

"Melisande is going to wonder what the hell happened in her absence," he grunted. "What will we do about Drew? I don't really want to hit him in the face, not after all the shit that he just had to go through." Joshua frowned more, before sitting on the counter.

After a moment of thought, he pressed for more information. "So, is it just cats? Lions and leopards? Or are there more?" Oh yeah, now that he was aware of his situation, he was going to be like a fifth grader at a science fair.

"I got it. I don't know that I want another male lion around, anyways. One is enough," he said, smiling at Nick. "I can't believe I never knew you were around, though. Maybe I just don't pay attention. I don't know how, but I guess if I'd never smelled one before, I wouldn't really know what, in fact, it was." He raised his brows a little, folding his arms. "We're going to find a better way for Drew. Aimee mentioned syringes. Maybe we could fool him into a routine physical or something."

"A hyena? And Nico? I'm guessing that's short for Nicole, eh? Hahaha, what an ego you have," he teased. "I can't believe you ended up with a hyena of all things. I bet you've got a fairly interesting 'how we met' story, especially if you're saying you met on a job. Is she military,  or...?" he trailed off. The Guilds didn't cross his mind, because - well, Wesley knew that to be Nick's wife you had to be perfectly capable, but he just figured... something else. Especially from the fact that they had a kid and everything.

Aimee frowned right as Josh did, giving him a sharp look when he complained about being beat up.  He'd asked for it!  "I got tired of beating around the bush, and you guys make me crazy.  I figured now was as good a time as any," she told him simply, shrugging her shoulders and then wetting a new paper towel so she could get back to cleaning up his face.  She HAD hit him harder than she planned.  "I AM sorry, though."

Oh, he wasn't kidding when he said that Melisande was going to wonder what had happened in her absence, but Aimee was pretty sure she could fill in the blanks and try to make sense out of things.  At least Melisande couldn't smell things the way a lion could yet, or she'd never miss Nick's presence.  He had a VERY attention-getting way about himself, and that showed in his scent.

"No, it's not just cats.  There are snakes, wolves, hyenas, birds, and plenty of others.  As for Drew, I guess we're going to wait and see what Melisande says.  She wants him to recover from one mess before he gets into a new one, and I can't say I blame her.  Hopefully, by the time he's better, she'll know what to do with that," she said honestly, sighing and still trying to be gentle with his face despite the way she'd wrapped a paper towel around her knuckles.  It would take a little while for the infection to actually start healing him, so he'd still be sore.  "I'd prefer it if it didn't have to be spread through violence, personally.  That was your choice."

Actually, knowing these guys, it'd be Drew's, as well.

"One?  You're forgetting my brother," Nick remarked, cocking an eyebrow up.  "My younger brother works in the NYPD, and he's an even bigger lion than I am.  I can still kick his ass, but he's no pushover.  If you run into him, I suggest backing off.  He's a little more 'animal planet' about other male lions than I am."

That was an understatement.  Jaime was more the sort to chase other male lions out of the area, while Nick would work with people and tolerate it.  It was surprising, given their usual way of dealing with things, but that was just the way it was.  A lot of things were unusual about them, especially Nick having a wife and family with how much Jaime loved kids.  Nick loved HIS kid, but most children just weren't a big deal to him.

"Actually, that was Skye's doing.  I didn't name her Nicole, but I sure as hell wasn't arguing," he explained with a grin.  No, he wasn't, at all.  "Yeah, she was trying to steal my kill, ironically enough.  We were both on the same assignment without being told we'd have competition, and I intercepted her before she could take the guy out.  We both took credit for it, and ran into each other again later.  She works with one of the Bruja guilds."

"Yeah, yeah," he muttered, ceasing his fussing to let Aimee blot at his face. It was still sort of numb from where she'd clobbered him, but he was sure that it would wear off into that familiar throbbing sensation he was used to. He wondered why he didn't just have metal implanted in his face for all of the hits he took. Josh was the first person in a fistfight, always.

"Wow, that sure is a lot of different types," he said, genuinely surprised. "How does... how does it happen? I mean, where did they come from? How long have they been around? Wow, I wonder if I know a few and don't even realize it," he said to himself, sitting back a little as she hit the center of the cut. He winced a little, but didn't move any further.

"He probably will, too. Drew will want to throw one of us against a wall after this episode, anyways, I'm sure of it," he muttered.

"Huh? NYPD? How could I have never seen him, or even smelled him?" Wes asked, dumbfounded. "I guess we never really talked about your brother at all, so I didn't think you had one. I guess it's natural to assume he'd be a lion, too, but I don't know how that could have gotten passed me. As for me 'staying away from him', Nick, that's all well and good, but nobody affects my job. If we've gone this long without running into eachother, hopefully it'll stay that way. I've been through a little too much bullshit to let someone try and run me over," he said, and he meant it. Wesley wasn't above a lot when it came to standing his ground, especially since he didn't go looking for fights.

He switched back to the subject of Skye, raising his eyebrows when Nick mentioned that she was a member of Bruja. "Wow, how about that. Two peas in a pod, huh? I hope she's not in Frost; I've heard those women are a little brutal," he joked. "I still don't see how she managed to produce a lion. I thought if she'd been carrying it'd be a hyena... You guys must've had a pretty good doctor," he mused.

Wesley didn't know, of course, that Skye had seen Mitchell and Garrah almost exclusively in order to see that she was in good health and particularly Garrah to make sure she couldn't shift, but then again, it wasn't common knowledge.

"Honestly?  I don't really know for sure.  We've found that shapeshifting is transferred from parents to children through genetics, but that it's not a scientific sort of thing.  Shifters can be made through science, or at least, the breeds can be adjusted using science, but there's an aspect of magic to it that just can't really be explained.  My boyfriend's been working on it for quite some time," she explained, not really thrilled to admit that she didn't know for sure how it all happened in the first place, but they were working on it.  "There are stories, of course, but nothing we can take for certain.  Shifters have been around for a very long time, though.  I really wouldn't be surprised if you knew some and didn't realize."

Wow, if only she knew what the NYPD looked like.  Wait until Josh realized.  That'd be a hell of an awakening.

She couldn't help looking a little surprised, and perhaps putting a slight bit more pressure on his cut than she intended, but she recovered quickly and offered him an apologetic look, after he mentioned Drew wanting to throw one of them against a wall.  "Wow, he really doesn't strike me as the sort to do something like that, but I guess...he is SWAT, and didn't you say you two were in the Marines together?"

It was possible, and actually probable, but she just hadn't pegged him for it.  His personality seemed so laid back and...safe.  She had only seen him around Melisande, however, and that could make a hell of a difference.  "Hopefully, we can do this for him without violence.  Are you planning on telling him everything I told you before he gets infected?"

Nick regarded Wes pretty evenly, not really letting on what he was thinking, and he accepted what Wes had to say.  Basically, if there was an issue between Wes and Jaime, he was going to have to settle it for them.  "Let me know if anything comes up," he said, and that was all.  There was nothing else TO say on it, and he wasn't going to deal with 'what if's.

Skye and Nico were a much brighter topic, particularly here and now, so he turned to them, instead.  Much better.  "No, she's Crimson.  I don't think I'd have the patience to deal with some of the Frost women on a regular basis," he explained easily, back to the more amused expression, and planning on sticking with it.  "Honestly, I was expecting Nico to be a hyena.  Can't say I'd have preferred it, but I expected it.  It makes sense, with Skye being a hyena, but you're right, we had good doctors.  Otherwise, we probably would have lost the baby."

NOT something he wanted to consider.  It was true, mixed breed marriages like this were tough for that reason, since the wrong breed child could be harmed if the mother shifted, or harm the mother.  He'd been worried, and that was why they went to Nero Garrah.  He wasn't going to explain that unless the information was ever needed, however, just in case.  Garrah didn't seem to want fame where these things were concerned.  Fame brought attention, and it wasn't always good attention.

"Wow," he muttered. Boy, would he be in for a surprise when he went into work in about two weeks. He'd be in Zoo York Police Department according to his nose. Too bad Aimee didn't know just how many of them were supernatural, or she could have warned him. As it was, he would probably be blowing her phone up every five minutes to ask if things were normal, et cetera.

"Drew? When you push him hard enough, he'll push right back," Josh said matter-of-factly. "We were in the Marines together, yeah. He's relaxed and cheerful because that's just how he is, but I wager if he'd have been down there when that vampire attacked me, that sumbitch would have bitten off way more than he could chew," he said. He meant the vampire, of course. "He's not a little guy, we're just both dwarfed by catzilla in there."

Wesley nodded. "Okay, fine," he said. It was all that needed to be said on the matter, really; if Nick implied that he would handle it, than Wes had every reason to believe him. Nick was a man of his word, if nothing else - it might not have surprised Wesley as much to learn that he was a mercenary for hire, really. Then again, not much did surprise Wesley these days.

"Crimson? Intel and recon, hahaha. That sounds right up your alley. I bet she's one of them gals that looks about as threatening as a potted plant until you get close enough." She'd have to be to put up with Nick, he thought to himself. It wasn't a negative trait. Here was a group of men who desired women that could hold there own in the ring; take that oppressive chauvinism! These men liked women who could kick ass! "Well, then that's all the more reason to suggest that lions, naturally, have the best genetics," he said, half-joking, half-serious.

If you asked Wesley if he'd rather have been anything else, despite all of the internal conflicts he had over it, or external given the latest situation, he'd still take lion any day of the week. He could have ended up something worse, anyways. Like a sparrow.

Too bad Aimee didn't know a lot of things, like how he was going to be calling her all the time to make sure everything he was going through was normal, and how it would be to have a male leopard around.  One that she wasn't related to.  She hadn't yet thought that it might be a mistake, and hopefully, she wouldn't think so later.

"Well, I'm sure we'll get to see just how much trouble he is eventually," she admitted, though she still had trouble imagining it.  She believed him, especially because this was the guy's best friend talking, but it still seemed to out of character for Melisande's 'Drewbear'.  "He's sure to throw a fit when he finds out about all this, either before we infect him or after, depending on when he's told.  Fortunately, you and 'catzilla' should be able to handle him without a problem, especially if the other lion is around."

That, she had no doubt about, and that wasn't even taking into account the fact that she and Melisande would be around.  Drew wouldn't want to hurt either of them, more than likely.  That gave them an advantage.  "So, would you prefer to just show off your cuts until the infection sets in and they heal, or would you prefer I find some bandaids?  I think Melisande has some with the Flintstones on them in the bathroom," she offered teasingly, turned a little smirk on him.  Oh, she'd love to crack out the Flintstones, and probably should have done it without telling him, but he probably would have noticed, and she wasn't as bad as his friends. 

Wes really had no idea on the subject of Skye.  Really, he didn't.  "Get 'close enough', and she'll still look harmless, right up until she jams a gun up under your chin.  Or I tear your arms off, whichever comes first," he offered lightly, knowing that it was the general 'you' and not specifically Wes.  Wes would know better than to get too close.  "Skye can definitely take care of herself, even if I still try to do it for her.  She's one of the most capable women I know, and still normal enough to keep a home-life that consists of something other than cleaning guns and building bomb-shelters."

That was a big deal, believe it or not.  He required just a few things, and that was the ability to hold her own (at least until he could get there and kick ass on anyone that dared touch her), and the closest thing that could pass for a 'normal life' that was possible for them.  Skye was all that, and he loved it. 

"Of course lions have the best genetics.  Anyone that tells you different is jealous," he agreed easily, and he mostly meant it.  Not completely, but that was because he wasn't THAT egotistical.

"Ah, I think I'll pass on the band-aids. Tomorrow is Sunday, so I'm off, thank God, and I'll probably just call in with something contagious like strep. Wesley can fudge my medical report, he's done it before - I'm guessing, of course, that I'll have to, since any hospital is going to not know what the fuck to do with me, right?" he asked.

Josh picked up kind of fast once he had a handle on himself.

"Drew will be mad for a few days, but I'm willing to bet that Melisande will do some girl trickery on him if he doesn't let it go after a while. She's got doe eyes, I'm sure she can make them work," he commented off-handedly. He knew Drew well enough to know that if Melisande behaved extraordinarily cute, he might cave - especially if she presented the truth in a way that didn't explode his brain.

"We'll see," he sighed.

Wesley laughed as Nick agreed with him. "Well, whenever you guys want me over, give me a call." He rattled off his new number quickly so that Nick would have it, and then unlocked all billion of Melisande's locks to let him out. "Better not let Skye wait too much longer. If the ice cream place closes, I bet she'll throw your clothes out into the front lawn after she eats all your dinner."

Maybe he did know her afterall.

Aww, too bad he was going to pass on the band-aids, but she wasn't too surprised.  What DID surprise her was hearing that Wesley could fudge his medical report.  That took some talent, as far as she knew.  "No, the hospitals would have a fit with you.  There are doctors here and there that know about shifters and vampires, but not many.  If you ever end up going to a hospital, try to make it NYU Med, and ask for Dr. Batten.  He'll know what to do with you," she explained, and hoped he'd remember.  If he ever ended up in the hospital, it would probably be bad, so a surgeon wouldn't be a bad thing to ask for.

"In the meantime, I'll come over and help you deal with being sick.  I'm sorry, it's going to be miserable, but  there really isn't anything a doctor could even do.  We'll get you through it," she promised, and she meant it.  She'd come over and play nurse to make sure he got through it alright, especially since she felt responsible for the fact that he'd be feeling horrible.

She nodded her agreement with what he said about Melisande managing Drew, which made sense.  She'd have the most luck, that much had to be true, but she could imagine him being mad for a few days.  She would just have to leave that to Melisande.

Nick took down Wes' phone number quickly, gave his own, then headed out the door, promising to call him for dinner sometime the whole way.  "Don't worry, Skye is going to want to meet you, especially after I explain this whole mess to her, so we'll be in touch," he promised, and then couldn't help laughing at the image Wes painted of Skye.

She was a sweetheart, but she had her moments.  At the very least, his dinner would be gone if he waited too long, and especially if he missed the ice cream place.  "I'm sure I'll manage.  Catch you later, man.  Stay out of trouble."

"I can imagine, having the flu and not being able to take any painkillers for it. You said it lasts for a week? Man. It'll be like that time I got sick overseas. Talk about lack of medical care, heh. Drew was lucky I didn't infect him and everyone else, but I was pretty good about staying hydrated and staying away from them as much as possible. Damn desert. I bet I caught the plague," he muttered. "Guess I don't have to worry about that now, though, huh?" he asked with a grin.

"You sure your boyfriend won't get mad at you making sure I'm not going to die? I know I'd be a might jealous if my pretty girlfriend was playing nurse Betty with a guy I'd never met before," he said, brow furrowed. "I don't want to get you into trouble."

Well. Not anymore than she already was.

Wes laughed at Nick's departing comments, and then went into the kitchen to see what Aimee and Josh were gabbing about. "How's the face?" he asked Josh, nodding to the bump on his head. "Looks like she got you pretty good," he added, smirking a little. "Just think, in a few days, you'll be able to hit that hard - or even harder. There are benefits, man, you just have to look for them."

He flipped a chair around and sat down in it, looking up at them as they hovered by the counter. "You know, my brother still doesn't know about me. I debated on telling him so many times, but I figured it'd just create more trouble than it was worth. His wife is a wolf, so I figure if the fecal matter ever hits the oscilating device, he'll have her to hold onto. Nick went over the male lion thing with me one more time. I need to make sure Melisande understands, or Aimee, if you can, it'd be nice. Nick advertises that his brother, whom I've never met, is also PD, and is inclined to rip our faces off if there are a bunch of us. So. No male lions," he said. He sighed a little.

"I'd almost say he'd make a nice dingo because of his colouring, but I don't want to rob him of his masculinity like that. Melisande would be twice his size. Maybe he can be a tiger, heh." He chuckled at the idea of Drew as a tiger. "A leopard works, too. But - lions and tigers and... Josh, why couldn't you have been a bear?"

Josh chuckled a little. "Because if I'd had a choice, I'd have picked human - or at least mutant with really bitchin' powers. Like flying. Yeah, or pyrokinesis. Something like that. Shape-shifting is okay, though," he added, glancing at Aimee. "

She nodded when he asked about it lasting about a week, which was pretty typical for these things as far as she knew, and moved from cleaning his face up to running her knuckles under water to make sure there wasn't anything potentially unpleasant, like paper towel fibers, that would heal into it.  Not that it'd matter, since her body would take care of things, but she liked to be safe.  Marring herself up just wasn't an option at the moment.  "Nope, you don't have to worry about getting sick at all after this week.  We haven't yet seen a virus that can really do anything to a shifter."

Ah, too bad the 'boyfriend' issue wasn't as simple as science was.  She could answer questions about being a shifter all day, but when he brought Nero into things, that was when it got complicated, and then he had to say things like 'pretty girlfriend' and 'beautiful' like he had earlier.  It wasn't really that it embarrassed her, because it didn't, but she was used to getting comments like that in a drastically different setting, from people who really didn't mean it (or at least, who didn't care about her enough to REALLY mean it).  From Josh, it sounded different, and that was the part that mattered, that made her blush ever so slightly, even if she ignored it and pressed on as though he hadn't said it every time. 

"I don't see why Nero would get jealous.  You'll be too sick to be trouble, I'm sure, and it kind of is my fault you're going to be feeling so bad," she explained, but she didn't sound totally certain.  She'd tell Nero, and see what he said, but she was going to take care of Josh.  She felt bad, so leaving him to suffer alone just seemed wrong.

When Wes came in and started talking about benefits, Aimee took the chance for a chance in subject, laughing just at the thought of hitting harder being a benefit.  "Somehow, I feel bad for Drew in the next two or so weeks.  Try to take it easy on him, you two?  I'll talk to Melisande, and hopefully explain to her that there's a really large lion that says we're not allowed to have any other male lions, and hopefully she'll worry enough about his physical condition to avoid that."

Wes had a point about Drew's soon to be animal form, since it wasn't exactly decided.  He couldn't be a lion, so Aimee pretty much assumed that he'd have to be leopard, but if they had a better idea..."Josh, don't worry about offending me, especially when you would have preferred being one of the X-Men.  My pride can handle it," she teased him, shaking her head as she dab-dried her knuckles.  The cut was healing up just fine, even if it was sore in the meantime.  "I thought Drew was going to end up a leopard, since lion's out of the question, but if he's really against it, or Melisande is, I suppose I could talk to Nero and see if he has anything around the lab he can use.  I know he got a tiger blood sample in at one point, and he has others.  We'll have to talk to them when they wake up."

"Okay," Josh said. "When should I start feeling like hammered shit, anyways? I want to try and get home before that happens. I hate driving with a fever, it makes my road rage that much harder to control," he said with a small laugh. No. Seriously. If Josh wasn't a cop, he'd be a serial killer on four wheels. He hated how people in the city drove, and his car wasn't parked that far from the apartment. He'd just have to get Wesley to walk him to it, which made him feel like a little girl all over again. He scowled.

"Talk'a me about what?" came a voice from the opening where the kitchen led into the living room. Melisande stood, sleepy eyed, in a pair of flannel pajama pants and a light blue tanktop. Her hair was messy enough, and she yawned a little, rubbing at her eyes. "Drew needed me to get him some water," she said, moving through them to the cabinet with the cups. She pulled one down, and looked up at the lot of them.

"Well? Not everyone all at once, now," she said. She'd started to pick up Drew's speech patterns. It was disturbing.

Josh jumped off the counter. "That's my cue. Wes, can you walk me to my car?" he asked. "I'm not really feeling like having a repeat of earlier." He didn't want to verbally mention that he'd almost been hamburger meat, because Mel wouldn't appreciate not being woken up for that ordeal.

"...sure. I wish I had what you just asked recorded, though," he said with a grin, standing up. "Don't worry, I won't make too much fun of you for it. Aimee, Melisande. I'll be right back. I need to help Josh locate his car in one piece, now that we're all paranoid about being snatched."

He and Josh headed out the door after a few more words exchanged, leaving Melisande and Aimee in the kitchen alone.

"Dang. They sure left fast. Somethin' I said?" she asked. She plunked down in the chair Wesley had been sitting in - the right way, not backwards - turning it to face Aimee more.

"Probably not too long.  I'm sure Melisande's already feeling it or will be shortly," Aimee answered, though she honestly couldn't be sure.  She hadn't ever gone through it, though she knew how to take care of people when they were sick.  It was just the details, like timing, that she wasn't entirely sure on.  Maybe she would give Victor Batten a call, just to see what he had to say on the process.  She knew he'd seen brand new shifters, and those infected, in the past.

Speaking of Melisande, she popped up just in time to hear a little more than Aimee intended.  Even better, Josh and Wes decided to skip out and leave her to deal with it.  Great.  Just what she wanted, though it'd probably be easier that way, in all honesty.  Wes didn't exactly have great people-skills, or so she'd come to understand from this whole ordeal.

"No, it's actually something I need to say.  You missed a few things while you were sleeping, including Josh taking off and nearly getting eaten by a vampire.  The lion that infected Wes actually showed up, coincidentally, and saved Josh.  He seems to be the top lion in the area, and he's pretty dead set on no more male lions," she explained, watching Melisande.  "He and his brother both live in the area, and apparently, Josh, Wes and Drew work with his brother and didn't realize.  He's pretty sure that if any other male lions pop up around here, his brother is going to have a fit.  It might get violent, so I'm strongly suggesting, we all are, that you don't let Drew become a lion.  The last thing he needs after all this is to be thrown into a mess with a bigger, more experienced lion trying to kill him or chase him out of the city, and that's what I gathered this guy would do."

She was trying not to be too pushy, but she had to make sure that Melisande got the picture.  It would be BAD news.  "I could still make him a leopard, or Josh could, or Wes keeps talking about a tiger.  I could probably get Nero to get us tiger if you wanted.  I just think that lion would be a really bad idea, honey."

She was silent for a few minutes, and then brushed some of her hair out of her face. "Glad I was sittin' down," she grumbled. "I wish Wesley hadn't have gone all psychotic and done that, then. I would rather me and Drew have been the same. I think it might have made things easier." She frowned. "You telling me is one thing - let me try to explain to Drew why he can't be a lion. Not that he's got his heart set on it, or anything for that matter at the moment, but I'm sure he's going to want to know what I am."

She sighed angrily. Wesley had put her between a rock and a hard place, and it pissed her off, but she was too tired to really express it. She just looked severely annoyed, which was enough. "I don't know what I want him to be," she said, her voice a little shrill. "You and Josh are already leopards. I figure if we're going to do this, we need to have a little variety at least. I'll just have to ask him. Who knows, he may not want to be a cat at all." She doubted that, though. Given the other choices, the cats were at the top.

"A tiger sounds interesting, but I wonder if we'll get along. What if whatever animal he chooses and the animal I am don't get along like we do?" she pressed, looking concerned. She obviously didn't know about Nick and Skye.

She understood, really, she did, and that showed in the sad, pained look she gave Melisande.  She wished Wes wouldn't have jumped the gun and done that, either, but she also didn't think it was the end of the world.  Melisande and Drew could still make this work. 

"Honey, I know it sucks, but I'm sure it'll work out no matter what Drew chooses.  I'm partial to cats for obvious reasons, but I'd suggest staying away from snakes and birds, which basically leaves wolf or hyena.  I somehow doubt that it would really be a problem, but hyenas and lions do a lot of competing in nature, so that may not be a good idea.  Besides, I'm pretty sure they're matriarchal, which may or may not affect his personality.  I don't think you want that."

Personally, she'd have been pissed if her boyfriend was a hyena who took shit from other women and was totally whipped by the hyena matriarch.  She didn't think Melisande would be okay with that, either.  "I would probably suggest something feline, or wolf.  If you don't want him to be a leopard, I can talk to Nero and see what he could manage, or we could jump Drake and steal some of his blood," she offered with a little smile.  She'd help, however she could.  "That gives you the option of cheetah, though I think Drake might have a canary if he found out you infected someone.  'Not pure!' and all that jazz."

Drake was a freak, they all knew that.  At least he was a cute freak.

"Yeah, no hyena," she agreed, frowning a little as she thought. "Cat is really all that appeals to me. I know he won't say wolf - Drew hates dogs with a burning passion. Can't say I blame him much, with the exception of Marius, I mean. Especially now. And anyways, I already feel like shit. What is this, time release? I felt fine before I went to bed," she complained. She felt like she had a slight fever, and her body was aching a little.

"We can wait and see. I don't think I like cheetah all that much; what if Drew's ego gets as big as Drake's does? I'd have to kick his face in myself," she commented. She loved Drake, but she knew his pride would be something Drew wouldn't wear well.

She yawned a little, resting her elbows at her knees and bending down to put her face in her hands. "Can't I take some Tylenol or something?" she asked Aimee. "If I'd have known this would happen, I'd never have gone to sleep. I'm going to have to turn the A/C down so I don't wake Drew up with all the warmth I'm putting off."

Aimee smiled as Melisande went down the list of potentials, including dissing on dogs and Drake's ego.  "I don't know if it works like that.  I'm pretty sure Drake's ego is the way it is because he was raised that way, not because it's a breed characteristic.  I really think that the biggest problem regarding his personality would end up being lion, simply because of the way they react to each other.  Any predator may make him a little more aggressive, and something smaller and less dangerous might have the opposite effect, but you already said that cat is really all that appeals to you."

Poor Melisande.  She already felt bad for the girl, which really meant that Josh wouldn't be all that far behind.  Why had he left?  The way things were looking, Aimee was going to end up taking care of both of them, so why hadn't she made Josh stay?  "You can take some, but I don't know how much good it can do.  It can't hurt, I guess," she admitted, moving to grab Melisande something that could hopefully make her feel a little better, and by the time she returned, she'd had time to consider the Drew predicament.

"I may have to kick Drew out for this, you know.  He's going to be worried about how sick you are, and we can't take you to a doctor," she pointed out.  He wasn't going to like that, but the alternative was telling him what was happening.  He wouldn't like that, either.

"I don't know," she said, taking the bottle of Ibuprofin, which was the only thing she really had available in her kitchen that Aimee would find with virtually no trouble. "I kind of want him around, but I guess if he's going to get in the way, you can just tell him that I'm highly contagious. Heck, we can say Josh caught it, too. You could even 'fake sick' if we needed to be convincing," she said thoughtfully, before swallowing down two tablets. Inwardly, she knew they wouldn't help her.

"I don't know what to do about him," she sighed. "I guess we're just going to have to wait and see. What else can we do? I wonder what I'm going to be like after this. Do female lions have any striking traits I don't know about? I've never even seen one before." She looked at Aimee expectantly.

It was sort of funny that everyone was using Aimee as the shapeshifter encyclopedia at the moment. In other circumstances, she might have been pleased to share the knowledge, but in such a.... left fielded situation, Melisande felt that they all could have done with a little more normal circumstance.

"We'll see how he takes it all.  If he gets too obnoxious, I'll chase him off, but otherwise, we'll let him stay.  I have a feeling he's going to sleep for awhile longer, anyway.  Otherwise, we can wait as long as Wes will allow, but I think he's going to start getting pushy about it once Drew is well enough to leave the apartment, and it's not going to take him that long to recover.  He's not well, but sleep and food is going to fix that quickly.  It wasn't like he was badly injured," she pointed out.

The problem there?  Melisande and Josh were going to be sick for at least a week, and Drew was going to be better sooner than that.  What happened when Wes got pushy about Drew?  Melisande would end up having to make a decision through a fever, which wasn't smart.  Otherwise, Aimee wouldn't push for this discussion now, when she was starting to feel nasty. 

"I just don't want it to be an uncertain answer while you're feverish if Wes gets antsy about Drew returning to work," she continued, then hesitated to think about the question asked of her.  Female lions?  Really, she wasn't an expert on this, but she didn't know of any particular traits they had.  "Well, I don't think I display any traits specific to a leopard.  I think the only thing you're going to have to worry about will be not stepping on the toes of the male lions in the area.  Since Nick seems to be the top lion, he's the one you'll really need to get along with, but he appeared to be a reasonable, decent guy.  I don't think your personality is going to change all that much, though you might feel a little more aggressive.  I worry for Drew if he's not something big enough to hold his own," she teased.

Melisande shrugged a little. "I hope he doesn't get too pushy. I'll just beat him up, now that evidently I might be able to." She wrinkled her nose a little. "He might be big, but I'm spry, heh. I'll just have to watch out he doesn't flatten me. I bet he's huge as a lion," she muttered. Even she was a little nervous about how things would be when they changed. "Who is Nick, again?" she asked. The fever might have been setting in, or it could just be that she was dog ass tired, too. "And, I don't know about aggressive. I guess I can see myself being more protective, but I'm not a very aggressive person at heart. I don't want to change," she said, more or less to herself. She didn't.

"Let me deal with Drew. Wes won't come in here without someone letting him in, or I'll make his life very hard," she threatened. "I imagine Josh could come over, but I bet he won't want to get out of bed. It's pretty much how I feel, now. Like I have strep and the flu at the same time, ugh," she moaned.

"You're lucky. You were born this way. I bet it's easy when it's second nature," she teased.

Melisande talking about beating Wes up was amusing, but Aimee worried a little about a case where Wes wouldn't accept 'no' for an answer.  She wasn't stupid, and she knew that if Wes wanted to do something, neither she nor Melisande would be able to do a whole lot about it.  She hadn't seen him in lion form, either, but she was pretty sure he'd be massive.  Short of having Nick around, she didn't think there was anyone in their little 'group' lately that could stop Wes if he had his mind set on something.  Hopefully, he wouldn't make a decision like that any time soon.

"Nick is Wes' friend, the lion who originally infected him.  We ran into him when Josh made his jailbreak earlier.  He's even bigger than Wes is, and like I said, he seems to be the lion in charge around here.  I'm sure he'll want to meet you when you're feeling better," she told Melisande, not really thrilled with the idea that the girl had forgotten already.  She had to be getting ill already.  Aimee just hoped Josh made it home alright, and where was Wes?  Had he gone with Josh?  She wouldn't have blamed him.  "Take it easy on Wes, Melisande.  I know you have every right to be mad at him, but he means well.  He just doesn't want any of you getting hurt, especially with what happened to Drew."

Was she really defending Wes?  After going all Spatula Ninja on him?  Yes, she was.  She understood his predicament, even if she disagreed with his solutions for it somewhat.  She couldn't really argue with the results. 

"Don't worry, it'll be second nature for the rest of you before long.  It's not nearly as difficult as you think," she assured her friend with a smile, wanting to reassure her.  Really, it wasn't bad.

Unfortunately, Melisande was on the opposite end of the spectrum when it came to Wesley. She knew she couldn't really kick his ass, but she'd bet she'd make him sorry for whatever he did. It was her natural ability as a female to make men feel guilt, regardless of their species, if they were of the sort that were capable of feeling it. She was betting Wes was, given how things had been happening thus far, and some of the stuff she'd heard him saying.

She glanced up as Aimee told her who Nick was for the second time, and frowned. "Wow. I remember you telling me that, now. Maybe I should go lay down," she muttered. She leaned back in her chair again before standing to try and shuffle to the cabinet for a cup so she could get some water. When she sat back down, she had a nice glass of ice water, and she felt a little better.

"I sure hope so. I bet Eden will be thrilled, though," she said coarsely. "I was the only human at All Hallows, and now I'm not. I feel a little unspecial, although now I'm the only lion, which is still kind of interesting. I wonder how Nikolas and Marius will react?" she ventured, smiling a little. She must not have been feeling terrible yet, to be able to joke.

Wesley finally came back to the apartment around that time, giving a soft knock on the door before he opened it. He poked his head in, making sure that Aimee wasn't crouched with another kitchen utensil to try and attack him with - noting that the women were both in the kitchen area, he came fully in, shutting the door behind him.

"Josh is safely on his way home. I caught Nick out on the street and talked to him about dinner. Mel, as soon as you're sorted, he wants to meet you. I'm sure his wife will, too," he said. He thought about pulling up a chair, but he opted to stand instead, situating his massive form next to Aimee.

"I miss anything?" he asked.

"You should probably go lay down soon," Aimee agreed, but she wasn't at the point of chasing Melisande off just yet.  She was still functioning and talking, so she might as well enjoy it while it lasted.  The next few days were going to be less than pleasant, to say the least.  "Do you want me to warn Marius and Nikki, or would you rather surprise them?"

Really, she was cool with either, though the idea of two vampires being that shocked was entertaining.  Of course, Melisande was a lion, and obviously not infected by anyone those two knew.  That was asking for trouble from them, so it'd take some fast explaining to keep them from looking for lions in the city.  They put a lot of work into keeping Melisande safe.

Fortunately for Wes, the Spatula Ninja was comfortable in the kitchen, and no longer quite as angry, though she'd had to bend Melisande's spatula back into its usual working order afterwards.  She was hoping the girl would never noticed.  "Well, that solves the Nick issue for you, Melisande.  I promise, he seemed to be a really nice guy," she assured her friend, not wanting her to stress over something as silly as that while she was starting to get sick. 

"I think we've established that I'm calling Nero to see what shifter blood samples he has in the lab for Drew, actually.  Melisande is partial to feline, and it's been brought to my attention that Drew dislikes canines," she explained, summing the conversation up pretty quickly.  "She wants to wait until she's better, am I correct, Melisande?"

That pretty much meant keeping Drew out of trouble in the meantime, which was why she brought it up.

"You may as well warn them. I don't want them thinking something really bizarre happened - like, you know, what actually happened. Just tell them that I was infected by accident. I don't really feel like trying to do more damage control than I have to," she said with a sigh, pinching the bridge of her nose a little. Headache was fail, and that medicine had done fuck all for it. She got up to go turn the air conditioner down a little, and then came back and sat down, looking pointedly at Wesley.

"I want to wait until later. Understand me?" she asked. Her eyes were wide and serious, though her voice was a little strained due to feeling like shit. Aimee might be proud of her, though - she was definitely not afraid of him. Not that she had a reason to be, but Wes was intimidating with his size alone - the fact that he was the one who'd tried to take control of the situation only made Melisande more wary of other male lions. Were they all so damn pushy? She hoped not.

"Okay, then. I wonder what other specimens he has?" he said aloud, though he was thinking to himself, really. "I've only seen the basic handful of breeds. Heh, maybe Drew will end up a bobcat and Melisande can roll him every time they get into it. Lions, even females, aren't precisely small. You may want to find something that still leaves a little of his manhood in tact," he pointed out with a small smile.

He looked at Melisande as she spoke, and narrowed his eyes a little. "I said I would leave it alone, and I am. Don't start getting into my shit about things I haven't done," he said. He wanted to snap at her, but he knew that most of this was primarily his fault, so he left it alone. Still, he was getting sick of being told the same thing over and over again.

He looked back to Aimee. "Are you going to really have the time to take care of both of these two? I guess I can understand keeping them company, although it'd be easier if we could get them into one spot. I don't think there's any lie we can tell Drew that would make that happen, though," he admitted with a small laugh. He glanced back to Melisande.

"Listen. I had the same thing happen to me. It'll be over before you know it. Hell, I just slept the entire time with a damn IV stuck in my arm. They thought I had some weird sandbox virus, so when I got better, they figured they were regular geniuses. How about that?"

Nodding, she made a mental note to fill Nikki, Drake and Marius in on the fact that Melisande wasn't really human anymore, so they wouldn't try to kill Wes for it, even if he deserved getting his ass kicked for jumping the gun like that.  She didn't want to see him hurt, not really.

Unless it included a spatula.  She was all for that.

"Well, I know he has a tiger sample that's from an actual tiger shifter.  He's found a way to scientifically engineer just about any kind of animal into a breed of shifter, but it's not quite the same as what we do.  For one, there's less 'magic' to it, so clothes and jewelry don't shift.  I really don't think you want to do that to Drew, but it makes anything Nero can get his hands on a possibility.  He recently saved a kid from losing his leg after a bad car accident by infecting him with one of his engineered breeds," she said proudly, before winking at Melisande and adding to the thought.  "Housecat.  He's absolutely adorable and super fuzzy."

Not that she EVER expected Melisande to do that to Drew, of all people, or for his friends to EVER go along with it.  She was just hoping that it'd draw a smile out of her friend before moving on to dealing with how to take care of both Melisande and Josh.  "I think it'd be easier to have them together so that I don't have to run all over the place, and I'll probably need help between school and work, but I'm sure Eden will understand if I have to get a few shifts covered this week," she offered. 

Melisande smiled a little. "Tiger sounds nice. Too bad I couldn't be one, too. Then we'd match." She paused a little, and glanced at Wesley. "I'm not going to start acting all strange around you, am I? Because that would be really awkward," she guessed, slouching a little in her seat. She felt awful.

Wesley laughed. "I don't think so. I've never met a female lion before, but I think we're both old enough to be okay. It's not like we're hyenas or anything," he said, putting his arms behind his head as he reclined back in a chair he'd taken to.

He glanced at Aimee incredulously when she mentioned a housecat. "Really?" he asked. "Because, I don't know if Drew'd like being the smallest guy in the bunch, however hilarious it would be." He frowned as Aimee mentioned the scientific shifting types not being able to come back with their clothing. "Where does it go?" he asked, bewildered.

"I think he will, too. Besides, not like there aren't enough girls and guys there to cover it for you. Maybe he'll convince Nikki to dance," she said with a chuckle, though it hurt her brain to laugh. "I think I might turn in again, though." She stood and walked towards her bedroom, turning to them. "Feel free to camp out, if not, lock it on the way out. G'night," she sang.

Well, the unfortunate thing for Melisande was that she just wasn't going to be able to match Drew, no matter what they did to him.  Lion just wasn't a realistic possibility, and anything that even came close just wasn't going to match up.  A cougar looked almost similar, but Melisande would be much, much bigger than him, so that didn't really do him much good.  If Wes wanted something that could handle a lioness, a tiger was perhaps the only real option.  It was good for Drew that his friends actually cared about what he'd think of it, because otherwise, she could see Drew opening his mouth to Nero and getting a nice dose of 'housecat'.  Nero could be like that if he was irritated, especially if he didn't have instructions or plans that demanded that he do otherwise.

She actually stared at Wes for a moment when he asked his question, not really sure if he was serious at first.  Melisande was already talking by the time she realized that he wasn't kidding, so she smiled and said her goodnights (time of day being unimportant) before addressing that subject.

"They don't go anywhere.  As a housecat, that teenager just shifts right out of his clothes, then doesn't have them when he shifts back to his human form.  They don't stay with him like ours do," she explained.  She supposed it wasn't such a silly question, since most shifters seemed to take it for granted that their clothes went right along with them when they changed shapes.  She hadn't really thought about it until it happened, either.  "I actually feel bad for him, since having that kind of a problem as a teenager is pretty awkward.  I'm sure it'll make him more comfortable with nakedness, though."

That, or he'd get insanely paranoid about where he shifted, but she hoped he didn't take it in that direction.  That would just be sad for him.  Better that he feel confident in himself.  "So, you think tiger?  No matter what way you look at it, either he or Josh is going to be the smallest guy in the bunch, you know.  If you could think of another cat, Nero may be able to get it, but I don't have any brilliant ideas."

Wesley couldn't help but laugh when Aimee said that the boy was either going to get comfortable with nudity or develop issues over it. If only he'd known the real story - about Dez, Dawn, Dirk, and Sebastian's mystery cat. He'd have laughed harder, and possibly liked to have met the brothers.

"Tiger would be nice. He'd be big enough to hold his own, but they're not as aggressive as lions are. Drew is an amicable guy, but he's very capable. I wouldn't want to see him crippled because he got turned into a labrat instead of a big cat. Besides, I really think it would be good for his ego," he said, dropping his voice. "Not that he has much to worry about, but look at it this way - finding out that all your friends are now bad-assed werecat things and you're either human or the size of a raccoon - and, if we end up having to use Nero for real - your friends have clothing and you don't..." he trailed off.

"Besides. Josh needs someone to wrestle with, and I'm just too big to play nice," he said with a toothy grin. He decided finally that he rather liked Aimee, and he wanted to keep her around. Not that it was a hard decision, but the fact that they'd gone through every emotion that evening and she'd managed to maintain both her composure and her temper... It spoke volumes.

"Melisande is very lucky to have had you around to watch out for her. I'm really sorry about what happened, Aimee. I acted on impulse, but it seems like it'll work out. Maybe with a female lion in the mix, we'll flush some more out of the woodwork. This city has three male lions in it, and I'm just thankful that I look to Nick as a sort of 'father' figure, or we'd have even bigger problems than crazy vampires."

If Aimee would have thought that Wes would have been interested for more than just a laugh, she'd have told him what she knew about Dez.  She actually thought it was very interesting, but she saw no reason why he would.  Who knew, in this city, Wes might accidentally run into Dez on his own.  She'd have paid to see that.

Wes made some very good points regarding Drew, and she could understand why the guy would have taken those things as blows to his ego, so tiger made sense.  Of course, a grown male tiger could be as big or bigger than a lion, even if the lion's mane made him look enormous.  Drew might still be too big to 'play nice' in wrestling with Josh, but she had a feeling it was his personality that would help in that department.  Given Josh's reaction to Drew's situation, she was willing to bet that those two were pretty close.  So, tiger it was, from the sound of things.  "Sure you're not just afraid one of them could beat you up once they're cats, too?" she teased, finding that image to be pretty amusing.  Josh might not be able to, just because of size issues, but Drew might as a tiger.

"Anyway, I'll call Nero in a little while to ask him about that tiger sample he has.  It's from our kind of shifter, so he'll be pretty normal, by our standards," she explained, and her thoughts turned more to the HOWs of the situation.  How they were going to break this situation to Drew, how they were going to infect him.  Were they going to have to do it the same as with Josh?

God, she hoped not.  That had been far too difficult.

Actually, asking JOSH to deal with it might be a good idea, though.  If anyone could do it, his best friend should be able to, though she could see Melisande being rather good at that.  Even so, he'd only been seeing Melisande fairly recently, and he'd been friends with Josh for years, through bad situations.  She'd be pitching the idea.

Wait, what was Wes talking about?  That was a sudden switch!  "Oh, don't worry about it all.  At least, where I'm concerned.  Melisande might be peeved for awhile, but I think she'll get over it since there isn't anything we can do about it now.  Personally, all of you lions seem to be nothing but trouble, but I suppose you'll all grow on me.  Just, warn me if you ever decide that Nick isn't working out as a 'father figure' anymore, so I can get anything I care about out of the way," she declared, still teasing, for the most part.  From the way those two behaved, she didn't think that was likely to happen, which was why her tone was so light.  She meant it if it ever came down to it, though.

Wesley laughed again as she spoke. "I don't think it will ever happen. I was under his command when we were overseas. Both of us nearly died, but thanks to him, I lived - by both the whole lion thing and because he was able to pull me out of a hot zone. I really owe him a lot, and I guess that's what makes it work. As long as I don't hear any attitude from his brother, I'll be fine. I don't know how I ever missed another lion in the precinct; it must just be because we work opposite shifts, days, whatever." He couldn't do anything except shrug at that; it was beyond him how he'd never known about Jaime, nevermind seen him.

"I'm glad it's from our kind of shifter, the sample. I don't think Drew would appreciate finding out he can change forms but clothing becomes a luxury. I can only imagine him demanding to know why he always comes back naked and we all look like we stepped out of a magazine," he chuckled. "It's going to be tough, but I think if Mel and Josh can talk him into it, we'll be fine."

He offered her another smile. "Lions aren't that much trouble, anyways. We just need more females around. I honestly don't understand how so many males popped up, but if we don't start seeing the lioness population curve soon, I might have to join some sort of online dating service," he laughed.

Really, Wesley couldn't picture himself with anyone who wasn't a lion. He liked women just fine, but something about humans didn't pique his interest. His brother's wife, Rina - beautiful, strong, intelligent, but definitely not his type. He didn't like wolves. He liked Rina fine, but she made his nose tingle.

Well, if anything, that sounded as though it would really do the trick in keeping those two from being at each others' throats all the time, and that was all that really mattered.  It was why lions really were a load of trouble, since they had this NEED to form something of a chain of command.  She didn't know where Wes sat in comparison to that brother of Nick's, but at least they all seemed to agree that Nick was at the top.  Otherwise, it could get messy, and nobody wanted or needed that.

She nodded her way through his story about his relationship with Nick, making noises of approval and understanding where they belonged, and that lack of true conversation was mostly because there wasn't much she could say.  Asking for details just seemed like a bad idea whenever a guy mentioned a rough situation like that, mostly due to trauma.  She didn't want to be the reason he dwelled on the memories, especially when everything was already stressful.  If he ever WANTED to share, she'd listen, but he moved on, and she let him.

"I don't think he'd appreciate it, either, in all honesty.  It'll be easier for him if he's as similar to the rest of you as possible, but we still need to figure out how to break it to him, unless you really just want to let Josh and Melisande plan it out," she offered, though she wasn't so sure about that one.  Not that she didn't think that they were capable, but she liked the abilities of a group to think of more than the individual. 

Heh, an online dating site for lions.  "Oh, I can see it now; PrideRock.com."

"And I bet if I started that and charged for membership, I'd expand into all sorts of interesting shapeshifter love connections," he countered, tone jovial. "Honestly, humans are too damn frail. I mean, I'm the size of a truck. There've been times when before, fooling around with Josh and Drew, I'd have to consciously stop myself from using any force at all, because I knew I'd just end up breaking their bones when we scuffled," he said, shaking his head. "I honestly think they're going to be better off, and much more pleased, certainly, when they realize how strong they'll be."

He paused. "Even if Josh will be smaller than both of us," he added, with a snort. "It's fine, though. He's a sniper, so he's a climber. He doesn't need something like size holding him back or making him terribly obvious, not that a golden and black spotted cat running around the city wouldn't be obvious, but you get the idea," he said with a wave of his hand.

"I'll let Melisande and Josh handle it, you can be sure. Now that I'm completely calmed down and LeCroix straightened my head out for me, I think I've already indulged in too much drama. I'm confident they'll be able to talk Drew into it. You should see the way he looks at Mel; she could talk him into walking off a building. I'm just glad that she looks at him the same way," he said with a knowing smirk.

It was a little apparent that they were smitten. Just a little.

She stopped, considering what he said about the shifter 'love connections', and shook it out of her mind.  "I don't even want to think about that," she told him, aware of just how scary people could be with their sexual issues, and she didn't want to even consider some of the images that could bring up.  Damn. 

Of course, him jumping right into talking about 'fooling around with Josh and Drew' didn't help, but she refrained from any giggling or anything she might have considered.  She wasn't really into gay men together, but knowing that these guys weren't and suddenly guttering that was pretty funny.  "Josh will be just fine as a leopard.  It's definitely one of the better breeds," she informed him, intentionally putting her nose in the air in her best imitation of Drake, though she ruined it by cracking a smile at the end.  Drake didn't think pride in his breed was a funny matter, even if everyone else did.

"Well, if they're going to handle talking him into it, the least we can do is go get the sample.  Do you want to come with me?  You can meet Nero," she offered, figuring it'd give them something to do.  It wasn't like Drew or Melisande were going anywhere, or Josh, for that matter.  Aimee and Wes were on their own, so something productive would be good.

"No, no, I'd rather see him another cat than anything else," he said, acknowledging her affirmation that leopard was a good breed; he personally couldn't consider it the best, because obviously a lion would never agree that there was any alternative but lion - well, except when there were too many males, but thankfully, Nick had put his foot down on that matter, effectively squashing the bug of an idea where it stood. Wesley didn't really relish the idea of being in any more of a constant competition with his friends than he already was.

He shrugged, the motion comical for how massive his shoulders were. "I think I can manage," he said, tilting his head a little to view the clock on the wall in the kitchen. He looked back at Aimee, and then nodded down the hall. "Do you think they'll be okay here on their own?" he asked, his brow knitting a little - not necessarily in worry or concern, more like... He was trying to plan around them. Wesley was the biggest person right now, which meant that he was on guard - or that was how his brain perceived it. In delicate situations such as these, Wesley was always willing to step up to the plate to absorb the brunt of whatever it was, mostly because he knew he could, and somewhere deep down inside of him because a voice told him he couldn't. What actions he took seemed to be in good faith, but deep down on a subconscious level were actually quite selfish.

He smiled through teeth to Aimee, aware that if she could read minds she may have tried for his throat. It was a conflict Wesley did not care to voice, ever, to anyone, under any circumstance, and he would dig his feet into whatever ground he gained and stand to stop it from happening, even if it meant occasionally looking like the bad guy to do it. Wesley was okay with being the bad guy, as long as he wasn't weak when he was taking the blame for it.

Well, with that decided, she hopped off of her seat and wandered over to get her shoes.  She'd call Nero on the way to warn him that she was bringing Wes along, and to give him a rundown of the situation as it stood.  She didn't doubt this would interest him some.

"I think they'll be fine.  Drew was so tired he could hardly keep himself awake, not to mention he ate more than I'd have thought he could, so he'll sleep, and Melisande is dealing with that infection.  They'll both probably be in the same exact place we left them, still fast asleep, by the time we get back," she assured him.  She highly doubted that anyone would break in while they were gone, and they'd lock up.  She was planning on leaving a note and snagging Melisande's keys so that they could get back in, anyway.

Once she had her shoes on, had written the note and grabbed the keys, she glanced at Wes.  "Ready?"

Wesley nodded, following Aimee out of the apartment and down to her car. He was, at the very least, relaxed enough to let her go in front without having to worry about someone jumping out and attacking her. She impressed him with her capabilities; he could definitely see some differences between being born a natural shapeshifter and contracting the disease somehow. It made her a little more comfortable in her own skin, so to speak, whereas Wesley was obviously still finding areas where he would fumble through ungracefully. Thank fuck he was a cat; it was the only assurance he'd land on two feet.

Once in the car, he glanced over at her as they started on their trek. "So, what'd your boyfriend say?" he asked. He'd deliberately payed his attention to his own phone when she had called Nero, because he wouldn't have been able to help overhearing the conversation. He called Joshua and left a voicemail, checked his own messages, and then sent a few texts to his commanding officer to let her know that they'd found Drew and that the situation was going to be 'hairy'. Cassandra would catch his drift, at least.

Aimee wasn't aware that Wes had warned his supervisor about the situation, but she'd have actually wondered how the woman would take it if she had.  Some people were entirely alright with those sorts of things, and others just weren't.  It was hard to tell, in some cases.  She hoped it all went smoothly, though.  There had been too many troubles already, so something else on their plate really wouldn't have been appreciated.

She sighed as she started up the car, focusing on getting out of the parking space to give herself a moment to organize her thoughts.  The call with Nero hadn't been long, and she couldn't say she disagreed with him, but it wasn't exactly what they'd wanted to hear.  "Well, he can certainly pull together a tiger sample for us to infect Drew with, and he'll even do the job if we bring Drew in.  The problem is that he's using the tiger sample that's our kind of shifter for his research, and he doesn't want to use it.  Drew would end up losing his clothes each shift," she explained, leaving out a specifically 'unless' situation.  They'd have to get a sample of their own if they wanted to change that fact.

THAT would be a mess, and the only way around that would be finding a willing donor for a little blood sample.  She was somewhat doubting that.

When his phone beeped back, he flipped it open, raising an amused brow at Cassandra's response. My department has turned into a zoo. At least she was optimistic. He smiled faintly at Aimee, anyways, right up until the point where she delivered the bad news.

"Shit," he said. "I don't want to stick him with that. He's already going to be mad; if all of us keep our clothing but him? He'll never talk to us again," he said. He didn't seriously think Drew would never talk to them again, but it would be a while. "I imagine it would get really old having to buy new clothing," he muttered to himself, glancing out the window.

"Well, we're going to have to figure something else out. Since we're already here, mind if we swing by Josh's? I want to see how he's doing. He's a bit more stout than Melisande is, so I doubt that he's going to be feeling sick just yet, but I'd still like to check on him." He paused. "I think being a leopard might just suit him after all. He's not the biggest guy in our little pack, but he's certainly fast. Anyways, maybe he'll have some ideas when we get there."

She could absolutely understand the sentiment, and that was exactly why she'd given him the bad news immediately.  Better to have him thinking about ways around it from the start of the car ride than to get all the way to Nero and THEN tell him.  Actually, if they weren't going to use Nero's samples, then they probably didn't even have to go to him.  That would be up to Wes, though he had a point about the clothing.  They were talking tiger, and that wasn't even a breed that was small enough that he could just shift out of his clothing and reclaim it later the way the Alys boy did.  A tiger would utterly destroy clothing, and that WOULD get old.

"That sounds good, actually.  I'd like to see how he's doing myself, and it doesn't really make much sense to go to Nero now.  If we're not using his sample, then there's no reason to waste our time or his," she offered with a shrug.  She'd fill him in on the whole story when she got home, but that wasn't going to change his mind, she knew that much.  Nero could be counted on to put his research first nine times out of ten, and this wasn't a personal issue for him, since he didn't even know Drew. 

She finally smiled, glancing over at the huge guy in her car, and she instantly felt tiny.  He and Nick had both managed to do that to her, just because they really were massive, but it didn't bother her.  Wes had been absolutely correct when he'd said that she was confident and comfortable in her own skin, and it really did show.  It didn't bother her that Wes outweighed her and could knock her through a wall because she knew her capabilities and how to handle herself.  She wasn't a hunter or a soldier, but she was certainly a predator.  She was a little tougher than she looked on first glance, and from what she could tell of Josh so far, he was the same way.  He spent time with Drew (who was taller and lean, but still muscular) and Wes (just massive), so he definitely didn't look like the biggest guy around.  She'd believe that he was fast, and now?  He'd only be faster.

"I think it'll suit him just fine.  I wasn't so sure about Drew as a leopard, but I think that Josh fits," she answered honestly.  She would have infected Drew as well, just because it was necessary to keep Wes from making a lion and a whole new string of problems, but Josh made sense to her as a leopard. 

  "You're just happy about him being a leopard because you have a crush on him," Wesley said glibly, sinking back into the seat as much as he could. He stared at Aimee with a deadpan sort of expression, and then broke out into a large grin. "I'm kidding!" he protested as the inevitable swatting began. "Stop! You're going to drive off the road!"

  After they'd calmed down, he went to staring out the window. "This was definitely not how I thought this situation was going to end. I had expected the worst, Aimee. I can't say I'm pleased now that all of my friends are animals, but I'm so, so thankful that Drew was alive." He paused. "I'm glad that you came. You're tough - tougher than you look." It was a complement of the highest caliber from him, even though it seemed sort of manly. Most women liked to hear about their looks or their brains, not about their physical prowess, but he had a feeling Aimee would like to be valued for not being a wuss just as much as Mel would.

  When they got to Josh's apartment, Wes led the way. The elevator was obscenely small, so he stood scrunched in next to Aimee and two children who were out way beyond their bedtime. They got off a floor before Josh's apartment, and Wesley only made a strange snickering sound as he heard their mother screaming bloody murder at them for taking off to play in the elevator and didn't they know it was dangerous to go out alone.

  Was it ever.

  When they got inside, Josh was wrapped in a blanket in front of the TV, looking somewhat bleary eyed. The door had been unlocked, which might have been a testament to how shitty he felt. "Hey there, buddy," he said, planting himself down in a chair. "Need anything? We're the cheer-up crew. We came to see how you were doing."

  Josh merely glared at him in return, and said, "I feel like hammered shit."

   It was the response that Wes had expected, and he looked pointedly at Aimee, as though she were supposed to have an idea of how to make him feel better.

Oh, yes, the swatting was inevitable over THAT comment, but she still laughed over it and rolled her eyes.  Her?  Have a crush on Josh?  How ridiculous!  She essentially said as much as she swatted him, though she couldn't argue that if she didn't pay attention to the road, they might end up driving off of it.  She was a pretty good driver (despite all the jokes about women behind the wheel), but that would have been a problem for anyone in that situation.

Jerk.

He fortunately seemed to be telling the truth when he said he was kidding, since he went on with much more serious thoughts than her having a crush on Josh, and she couldn't blame him.  Much.  "Well, your friends all being animals is your fault, but I know what you mean.  Drew being dumped in that alley like he was is extremely lucky," she agreed, still pretty surprised by that every time she thought about it.  That seemed so unlikely, but it had worked out wonderfully for them, at least where the redhead was concerned. 

Drew's appearance obviously wasn't going to be the only surprise, since Wes followed up that thought with a compliment about her being tough.  Not that she was pretty, graceful or smart, which were the ones she was used to and didn't really think much about, but that she was tough.  'Tougher than you look' could have been taken as an annoying remark, but she didn't think about it that way.  She knew how she looked, and she accepted it.  She knew that people found her attractive, and that was part of why she danced.  She had the looks for it, and that in turn only made her look that much more beautiful, that fact that she put out the effort for work.  She was also intelligent, which was seen fairly regularly by an entirely different crowd when she was at school or the lab.  She never heard anything about being tough, or even got to display anything of the sort.  In fact, most of the people who knew her were likely to brush her off as being nothing to concern themselves with, as though she'd cry over a little cut.  She wouldn't, but she wasn't going to brag about it or argue it.  That Wes had not only noticed, but thought to mention it, was actually both surprising and nice to hear.

"Thank you," she told him sincerely, and what else was there to say?  She felt pretty modest about it, like he really wouldn't think that if he'd seen her trying to deal with a real threat, but she still appreciated that he thought that.  Maybe her parents were right, and she DID need to start expanding her circles of friends past her job and school.  That would be worth some serious consideration later, after they were done dealing with the problems at hand.

She didn't mind letting Wes lead the way once they were out of the car, partly because it made him feel better, and partly because it made her feel better.  There were times when she would take the lead because she knew that she was the best person to have there, and that would have included a situation with Mel or with any of the women from the club, but there were certainly times when she knew she wasn't the best person for the job.  With Wes, a massive lion who had military and police training, she was satisfied letting him take point.  It made sense to her.

Of course, she didn't think the elevator was obscenely small so much as that Wes was obscenely large, and that took some of the man's intimidation factor away.  For her, at least, seeing him crammed into the little elevator was almost worthy of a laugh, but she refrained for the sake of his ego.  She'd already attacked him with a spatula, so she wasn't likely to find him extremely scary any time soon.  He was entirely capable of it, but it wasn't likely that he'd want to even try.  Josh wasn't all that scary, either, though his glare looked as though the man had made the attempt.  Aimee was sure not to look quite as pleasant and cheerful as Wes did, but she leaned down to feel his head and look sympathetic.

"So much for Josh being 'a bit more stout' helping his case any," she remarked, returning that pointed look of Wes' as though there was nothing he could do to bother her.  Wes seemed to think she could do something to make Josh feel better, and though a few things came to mind, none of them were actually serious or plausible without making Nero extremely upset.  It wasn't like Josh would have been aware enough to enjoy a striptease or a lapdance, anyway, and she wasn't offering for Wes.  He didn't need any cheering up.

"Well, are you hungry, or sleepy?  I could try to help with both," she offered.  Seemed like she was going to end up being 'Nurse Aimee' for everyone for a few days.