In the Snake's Den {tag;; Chris}

[Libby Belmont]

It wasn't like he had anything better to do, not really.  Despite the hour, precisely 10:52 PM, Nero was in his lab at the college.  The institution had closed around him and the last of the professors had long since left - that was preferable.  There was a slimmer chance of socializing if there truly weren't many people left in the building.

He didn't feel like going home.  There wasn't anything there; what he was working on was right in front of him.  He could have moved it all to his home laboratory, but that would have taken too much effort.  Nero was much better off where he was, forgetting time and focusing all of his efforts in his project.

Aimee was at "work" anyway.  Nothing was pressing him to go.

The lab itself was hot.  The air was slightly humid, coated with the late summer heat.  Fans sat in every corner of them room, and each faced something different.  A group of liquids before one, jars in front of another; he had to keep certain things at milder temperatures.  His refrigerator was particularly full during this time of year - it was too hot for most of his experiments.  Nero was unwilling to cool the lab down, though, as the heat was vital for his comfort.

Leaning over his desk, he peered into a microscope, twisting the knob to better focus on the cells before him.  Every so often he would pull back and write several notes about the properties of the sample, its composition, its movement; any details that he might need which could possibly be important to his research.  He had to make sure that everything was written down, no matter how insignificant it may have seemed as he did so.  He was not going to be the fool who missed something important out of ignorance.

His hand moved across the paper quickly, scrawling all of his findings as readily as he found them.  The words were chopped, written in his shorthand - very few people would have a clue as to what he was compiling.  That was how he liked it.

[Chris Matheson]

This one was a bad one, otherwise Chris wouldn't have been breaking into a college after hours to get at him.  They had cameras on their campus that he had to know how to dodge, which he'd managed after some research and pretending to be someone he wasn't.  Amazing how easy to fool Campus Security was.  Other than cameras, he had to actually make his way inside the building (he chose a window down the hall from where he'd established that his target would be), and not leave any evidence behind that would get the law on his ass.  That was why avoiding the cameras was important, since leaving a body behind was always a bad idea where cops were concerned. 

He full intended to be leaving a body behind. 

He was careful with the window, ensuring that he left behind nothing to suggest that the window down the hall had been his entrance point, and most police wouldn't even THINK to look that far from the crime scene.  He had a gun ready as he slipped down the dark hall towards the lit-up lab, his plan being to get in, fire and get out.  He didn't know what kind of shifter this guy was (which he didn't like, but he didn't want to wait too long and let him keep helping shifters and vampires).  That's right.  Not only was the guy a shifter himself, but he was using that scientific mind of his to help other shifters and vampires become more dangerous.  He didn't need that happening, since they were all already dangerous enough.  Damn monsters.

He stuck to his plan, using the toe of his boot to push the door open, slipping into the lab and scanning the room, then knocking off a shot (hopefully before his target had a chance to realize what was going on.  He didn't want to hang around too long.

[Libby Belmont]

It wasn't, per se, that Nero was particularly alert at the moment - he was focused on his research - but rather that he heard the human and he felt him coming.  And because no one should have been bothering him, because he was supposed to be alone, he raised his head when he heard the door open.  He wouldn't have in any other situation; he would have assumed it was nothing worth worrying about and spoken rather than moved.

The flash of metal was all that he needed before his instincts took over.

His eyes narrowed, pupils slitting and fangs parting his lips before he shifted.  Quick, it happened absolutely instantly, almost as though he had simply disappeared.  Not a half of a second later, the bullet pierced the wall behind where he should have been standing.

The snake hit the floor behind the desk, slipping into the corner and around the back to watch the human.  His tongue slid out of his mouth to taste the air - he didn't recognize this man.  He couldn't imagine what had brought on this attempted assassination.  Was this man a hunter?  But if he was, Nero had done nothing worthy of getting the guilds on him.  It seemed too unlikely.

Nero stayed low to the ground, hidden on the opposite side of the desk.  He wasn't a fighter, that wasn't his breed, but he was unwilling to die and this man was definitely human.  Nero could take him down if he had to, but he didn't want to.  He wanted to see this assassin's next move.

[Chris Matheson]

DAMN IT.

That dude moved FAST, which was pretty much the last thing Chris had wanted to see, since he'd moved pretty damn fast himself.  The problem was that his target didn't jump right into defense mode and attack him.  The guy just vanished.  That was something a vampire could do, but he'd never seen a shifter do it.  The guy could have shifted, but what the hell was he if that was the case?  A bird?

God, not a bird.  That'd just be pathetic.  Birds were smaller and harder to hit, but they exploded everywhere with the right gun.  That'd be a hell of a mess.

He didn't speak, but moved slowly, cautiously, to get a peek around the desk the man had been seated at.  He didn't see anything.  That wasn't good.  He really didn't want to find out that the guy wasn't a bird the hard way, which was looking pretty likely and prompted his backwards moving so that he could put his back to a wall while he watched the rest of the room, including where the shifter had vanished.

[Libby Belmont]

The human walked towards the desk, and as he did so, Nero went around the opposite way.  He didn't want the man to see him; that was the last thing he wanted.  He didn't feel like being skinned and made into a pair of boots or whatever it was that humans did to snakes.

Clearly, whoever this man was, he had no idea that Nero was a snake.  Otherwise when he had shifted, the assassin would have known exactly where he should have been looking and just what it was to keep an eye out for.  Nero silently thanked his luck - that made this all the easier for him.

He slithered across the floor, moving slowly to remain undetected as the man peered under his desk.  Nero positioned himself behind the man, watching him closely as he rose into a standing position.  Then, when the human stood up straight and took a step backwards, Nero shifted, reaching into his pocket to pull out a syringe full of clear liquid.

He knew there was a reason he kept this stuff on him.

Diluted green mamba venom.

Before the man could move further, Nero shot an arm out and covered the man's mouth with his hand, stabbing the needle into the skin of his arm with the other, the one that clutched the gun.  Injecting the venom with a quick push of his thumb, Nero said quietly, "Game over."

The venom would work its way through the man's nervous system and shut down his muscles.  It would paralyze him.  The area that was infected, his arm, would feel it first and instantaneously.  That was what it was for.  It wouldn't kill him, though.  No, Nero didn't want to kill him.

He had never had a human guinea pig before.

[Chris Matheson]

There was no time for a human to react to that.  None at all.

Nero had a grip over his mouth and was plunging something sharp into his gun arm before he could have even summoned up the strength to even try fighting back.  The arm in question was suddenly useless, absolutely impossible for him to move, and the gun clattered to the floor and thankfully didn't go off.  That'd have just added injury to insult.

What the hell was wrong with his arm? 

He glanced down, barely able to with the harsh grip over his face, to see a syringe (NOT A GOOD SIGN) and swung backwards with his other elbow even as he felt other muscles beginning to shut down.  Whether or not he connected, he was held until he simply couldn't stand any longer.  His muscles all just turned off within the next few moments as though someone had hit a switch, and he knew that he was FUCKED. 

This definitely wasn't the way he'd wanted to go, and none of his struggles had done anything for him.

[Libby Belmont]

Nero kept the grip around his would-be killer as the man struggled against him.  It was too late; there was nothing that he could do to get out of this one.  Even the swing that connected against the snake did not make him let up at all.  He only stepped with it, softening the impact just the slightest.  It was alright - Nero would have been disappointed if he hadn't at least attempted to save himself.

Making a soft, intrigued noise when the man suddenly went still in his arms, Nero put him down on the floor slowly, gently as to not damage him.  He needed him unharmed.  And when he was on the ground, Nero picked up the gun from the floor, eying it curiously before placing it on his desk.

"I wonder why you tried to kill me?" he spoke.  It wasn't truly a question - he knew the man couldn't answer.  "I'm afraid I've never seen you before, so it can't be some sort of grudge, can it?"  He stepped over his victim and around the desk, collecting his notes and beginning to put his equipment away.  "Although, I guess I really don't know, do I?  Maybe you're just a maniac.  It wouldn't be so surprising, would it?  This is New York City."

He pulled the sample from underneath his microscope and placed the cover back over it; this would have to continue tomorrow.  What he had right now was much more interesting than a strand of DNA.

"Well, let me tell you what's happening to you."  Nero was entirely conversational about it, as though he was speaking of trivial things.  "I've injected you with diluted neurotoxin, compliments of myself, so it won't kill you if you happen to be worried about that.  You're paralyzed, but it isn't permanent either.  It's just enough to keep you from trying to kill me again."

He smiled just the slightest bit, walking around the desk to look down at his new test subject, his new mouse.  "I think you were a little misguided, though.  I'm not the sort of man that you attempt to kill and fail while doing so, because..." he let out a soft laugh, "I have a lot of things, so to speak, that I need to test.  And, well, it's hard to test things that are potentially dangerous.  I'm sure you understand.  It's quite a lot of paperwork."  He shrugged a bit.  "But you won't be needing to sign any wavers, will you?  Not after you tried to put a bullet in my head."

As calm as Nero seemed vocally, he was visibly seething now that he had the chance to digest what had happened.  This human had tried to finish him.  Pay back was going to be a bitch and Nero was going to make sure of that.

"I hope you don't have anywhere to be."  He smiled too widely, teeth sharp and eyes narrowed.  "Because you're going to have to be a little late."

[Chris Matheson]

As that man held him through his weakening struggles, Chris didn't regret trying to kill him.  He also didn't regret it as the man walked around the lab, cleaning up after he'd laid his would-be assassin on the floor, as though nothing had even happened.  He didn't regret it as the man started to talk, calm and cold, and he definitely, most certainly didn't regret it when he was told what was going to happen to him.  Not because he was unafraid of what Nero was planning, or that he thought it'd be anything good, but because this asshole deserved it.  Nero deserved to die, and to have others attempt to kill him.  He deserved it, and so Chris didn't regret it.

He wasn't thinking that he'd be getting out of this, however, and he knew that nobody would come looking for him.  That was the price of being alone, so this monster would probably get away with it.  Chris would try, but he wasn't so confident in the possibilities of escape. 

He couldn't even try right then, though.  That neurotoxin had done a number on him, and he wasn't going anywhere.  He couldn't even move his head to look at the man as he spoke, nor could he respond.  Even so, it was painfully obvious that this sick freak was going to make his life hell. 

Wonderful.  Like nobody had tried that before.