The Marriott, Downtown Las Angeles

Elata skipped into the hotel. The lobby was quite nice! She slowly spun around to take it in before heading up to the desk. The clerk was a sunny blonde woman, who happily gave her room 224. She left a message for Michael with her about the room and bounded up the stairs, luggage and all. She unlocked it quickly and set everything down, flopping onto the bed. Oh what a day! and finally some rest. She leaned back and closed her eyes on the far too comfortable hotel bed. She awoke quite some time later. She looked around, Michael had not come back yet. She sat up and stretched, her stomach growled. It HAD been awhile since she'd eaten last. Perhaps she'd run and get something. The red head grabbed a pen and paper and left a note for Michael in case he returned, then gathered her purse and headed down the stairs and out the door. She sang and danced a little as she walked to a nearby sandwich shop. She should get Michael something, he'd probably be hungry when he returned. She thought about what to order him, spacing off a bit and slowing down her pace.

Jude had followed Elata.

Seeing Michael, his former brother, and Elata, the red-headed friend of Ivan, Jude had decided he could sit up some fun if he picked on the innocent young Seeker some. He waltzed into the hotel with a large overcoat to hide his distorted spine. His eyes wore contacts that made them brown, like Ivan's had once been. He sat down, and watched as Elata walked toward the door and exited.

Disgruntled, he followed once more, as she headed for a sandwich shop nearby. He narrowed his eyesas she moved, deciding instead, he would wait in her hotel room.

Jude turned on his heels, the Disruptor that he was, and reentered the hotel. He slipped this tiem through the window, and hid out there, his overcoat removed now, his ugly form totally revealed in the dark. Now, it was only a matter of time.

Elata returned with two sandwiches. She hoped Michael would like what she picked for him, if not, she would eat it. She smiled and hummed happily, rubbing a scar on the top of her hand as she entered the hallway her hotel room was in. She pushed the door open and didn't bother turning on the light as she set the sandwiches on a nearby table, taking an immediate right into the bathroom. She left the door open, assuming of course that no one else was there. The sounds of her changing her clothes and brushing her teeth could be heard. Finally she exited in a tank top and shorts, turning on the light. She noticed the man standing there, but her body took a couple more steps towards the bed she had intended to head to before it stopped in shock, dropping the sandwiches she had grabbed on her way. Her mouth gaped and her eyes were wide. She was completely still for a moment before gasping. "Wha-? I...van?"

A callous, sinister chuckle escaped 'Ivan's' lips.

Dropping his overcoat to the floor, the doppleganger, Jude-version of Ivan grinned mischieviously at Elata, his long, pointed tongue lashing about through the air. "Oh, hello Elata...did you miss me?" He sarcastically slithered his words out, using a mock version of Ivan's voice to taunt the red-headed woman.

Taking a few, daunting, intimidating stpeps forward, Jude laughed a little more. It would be so fun to toy with this woman. He didn't really intend on killing her, he wasn't evil. Just playfully cruel, and so he couldn't resist having a little fun.

"I missed you, you know..." the words were said in total phony regard, as he clearly did not mean them. He flaunted his mutilation of Ivan's body, showing off his disgusting scars of his torso, and the spine whic spiked out of his back through the gaping wound where Ivan's tattoo had been.

Elata backed up as he stepped forward, afraid at first. She knew Ivan had been dead but...what if he had some sort of odd power? What if the tatoo took him over somehow? or...God she didn't know. She didnk't know enough about holder...perhaps that's what had happened, maybe when he died he became a holder? But why would it come here? All this raced through her mind as she decided what to do. She didn't know what this thing wanted to do to her, and she did wan't answers, but the uncertainty about the creature's or...possibly a little bit Ivan's, ideas made her not want to stick around. The thing had waited in her room, not attacked her on the street, perhaps it didn't want to be seen in public, but what if Michael came back and it waited for him? As her back hit the wall concern for others won over. "Well...I did miss you...I think. It depends on who you are exactly." It was possible that it was Ivan taken over by his object. Her foot brushed against her luggae case and she began to covertly undo the zipper with her foot. Her face remained a mask of fear, but she was calming down on the inside.

This man, or beast, was clearly no longer ivan/

Jude's eyes glowed with a renewed intensity, as he eyed teh woman before him disgustingly, peering up and down at her small frame. He was very old, compared to her. Many thousands of years older, in fact. And it had been a long time since...

The thought occured to Jude that he could easily over-power Elata, in Ivan's body. Maybe even trick her, considering she thought he might be Ivan.

he switched his vocal chords around to match his predescecor, and his eyes became a soft brown color that was perfectly like ivan.

"Elata...you must believe me...I don't kno wwhat's going on myself, but..." For emphasis, 'Ivan' whipped his tongue about and looked at it in shock.

"You must help me! My body is turnign itno this...this...thing!"

If that was Ivan, he certainly did need help. Unfortunately for Jude, Elata's version of help when someone was loosing control of themselves was not as sweet as most people's. She dived under the bed and pulled out some rope, and her sword from her suitcase. She then shot up over the bed and began to distract him with the sword of thunder, making like she was going to strike him, but in the other hand she had the rope ready to restrain him. She also used her acrobatic skill to flip and twist her body in the air, confusing him further as to which direction which of her limbs might be giong. She swing the sword and it careened just above his head as she brough the rope down around his neck, lettin the loops fall so that he would be tangled if he tried to move and crashed into him fully.

The onslaught was, for lack of a better word, predictable to Jude.

He swung his body upward as the rope lashed around him, using his spidery, acrobatic limbs to fling himself out of the bond and onto the ceiling. He crawled on the walls menacingly, and hissed at Elata, grinning with a look of mad glee.

Worse yet, he was now blocking her exit.

"Tsk, tsk...Elata, that was some trick..." Like sand-paper, his voice practically scratched at the eardrums with claws as long as Jude's own.

"I'd have expected something...better...from the 'Great Elata!'" A hideous cackle escaped his lips, and he threw back his head in laughter, shaking the spikes on his back. No resemblance to Ivan remained at all, save for a slight hint in the twisted visage of Jude.

He looked back down, grinning at Elata as he awaited her answer to him.

She was able to twist and land easily and she watched him climb the walls. "Well, I'm just human you see, though I am pretty fit phsyically, I can't, say, climb on walls like a little spider." She grinned at the man blocking her exit with her hands on her hips, still holding the rope and the sword. "However I do know one useful thing. You may be in possession of Ivan's body, but you are not Ivan. I dion't know if you're one of the creatures that was at the battle or something new, but I'll have no mercy on you." She refused to show him the pain she felt when he spoke, though she did wonder if her ears were bleeding at all. She wasn't aware if he could block both of the exits in the room at the same time, so she tested the waters, vaulting backwards out of the open balcony door.

Still moving on Ivan's limbs like a demonic spider, Jude gave chase out the window and leaped through the air, his angular figure accentuated against the sun. He flew down through the air, landing with a crash on top of a parked car.

He stood up, pedestrians screaming and pointing in fear at his hideous appearance, reveling in the chaos of it all. Elata had landed but a few feet away from him, and he turned, hissing at her.

"C'mere you little bitch!" His voice was again like sand-paper, like cracking fire, like knife wounds to the heart, brain, and every soft fleshy part of the body. He leapt at Elata again, this time aiming to disarm and pin her to the ground.

Elata waited until he was almost on her then leaped out of the way and ran. She knew he would catch her, but she had to lead him away from public areas. She knew jumping out of the balcony was a bad idea! She ran as fast as she could until she found an alleyway that suited her needs next to some construction going on. Everyone had left for the day and due to the roads being blocked there was no traffic. He had pretty well caught up to her now, so she stopped and turned to him. "Okay! I give up!" she held her hands in the air. She knew she couldn't win in a fight, she had no more useful objects, and she couldn't risk the public seeing him again, she prayed he wouldn't kill her. If he did, at least she and Ivan would have their funerals together.

Jude stepped into the alleyway behind Elata, his eyes wild with intense ferocity, they burned so heavily like flashlights, pointing their beams directly upon the red-headed woman, his target. He sneered at her, chuckling in a low voice. He noted that she was trapped, unless she attempted any fancy acrobatics.

In which case, Jude was prepared to give chase once more, if need be.

"I'm not really one who likes torture...it's not my style. I prefer my victims dead in an instant...and..." Jude noted the rather strong feelings of frinedship Ivan had with this girl, and took just a smigen of pity.

"I can tell this guy I'm in, now...'Ivan'? He liked you a lot, so...I'll make it painlesssss...." He hissed the last syllable, grinning mischieviously as he came close enough for Elata to smell his breath, his long tongue lashing at her face and cheeks. When it came to making it painless, one thing was certain.

Jude was lying.

Elata took a step back and turned her face away, but not her eyes. She wouldn't let them leave the thing. She couldn't decide whether or not to go down without a fight. The decision really only took her a moment. When Michael found her...if he found her...she would want him to see she didn't give up until the end. It would be painful to fight, and much easier to just let him kill her, but she couldn't not fight. It went against her values. She jumped back and bounded off of a wall, flying towards him with a spinning kick. She was ready to bring the sword in right after her foot, she's hit him with something either way. She prayed to anything and everything for strength.

Elata's kick caught Jude in the cheek-bone, fracturing it qite painfully, with a sickening crack. The blow glanced off of him, and he hopped out of the way of Elata's sword, howling with pain and intense rage.

"Awwww hell! I just got this body!" Jude pivoted on his skeletal hands, and flung himself at the red-head with all his strength. Afterall, he wasn't quite super-human, he was bound by the limits of ivan's body. But his deformed nature gave him certain acrobatic advantages.

He stretched out towards Elata, clawing, slashing, cutting and scratching at her flesh. He tore at the poor woman's skin violently, bleeding her open, but not in anyway so as to be fatal. Shards of his ancient fingernails cracked off and lodged in her skin.

However, that was what he was going for.

Suddenly, Elata struck back with her sword, slicing through his chest in an agonizing move, cutting the flesh on the surface, so as to cause blood to flow from the Forsaken One's skin. He screeched, cursing at Elata in agony.

"Goddammit, nonononoNO!" He was clearly enraged, and flung himself once more at Elata, his claw outstretched toward her chest. He aimed to pierce her heart, and within seconds he would be upon her, the fatal blow struck. He grinned malevolently, and-

"IVAN!"

A flurry of green, of fur, wrenching at Jude's arm, as a wolf-like creature pounced upon him before he could complete his attack. Down the alley, a lone figure stood in the entrance, trench coat surrounding him, feet firmly planted on the ground in determination. The man at the end of the alley grimaced, having just saved Elata from near-death.

Michael stared down the battle, his Wolf of Loyalty tearing into Jude's flesh.

Elata had been ready to avoid the blow, and she had just barely gotten out of the way when the wolf like creature pounced and she saw Michael standing there. As the wolf grabbed his arm she took her sword and slashed at Jude as furiously as he had slashed at her, covering him in lacerations as well. As long as she wasn't using the thunder of the sword she would be alright. She ran him through the stomach as the wolf kept him in place and pulled up as hard as she could. It would take quite a few slices but she aimed to put Ivan's body back to the way it was before this thing had gotten ahold of it. To keep him nice and still she locked his arm with her own and kicked his legs out from under him, immediately using her legs to pin down his left arm and left leg, while she used to sword to sever his right leg's achilles tendon. The wolf was taking care of the right arm. She drove the sword down into his stomach again. "Well I don't know how easy it is for you to die, but if you have any last words I wouldn't be so cruel as to kill you without hearing them." She smiled brightly down at him, but the smile held malice in it. Blood dripped off of her and onto him as she stood there waiting for a reply.

It seemed to Jude that the tables had turned really badly out of his favor, and this annoyed him greatly. It wasn't so much it angered him, it just pissed him off superficially.

"Sod off!"

This was his only reply to Elata's question of him, and he forced the words out of his bleeding, broken jaw. He spit upward at Elata disgracefully, a mixture of blood and saliva.

It wasn't like he couldn't always come back later in a new body, even as annoying as that was. He could always find some new people to fuck with. But now, he really wanted to screw these guys over.

Abyssi Marnin's mosquito, flowing with Madness, chirped from Jude's shoulder and flew away.

Now Elata had her sword at Jude's neck, and he hissed. The Wolf of Loyalty gnawed at his flesh and bone, but with his free hand, or claw, he slashed up at the young woman, ripping her shirt right from her body.

Might as well get a peep show in before dying.

Michael approached the two, sneering down at the form of what had been his brother. "This is not Ivan. Miss Elata, I believe you may kill him if you wish, though to dishonor him would be much worse, I think. Death is but a mercy."

Michael looked upon his red-headed female friend as if he had not seen her in a very long time. True, the Holder test had put him through nearly an eternity of pain. But he persevered to where he was, and a sorrowful tone was in his voice as he spoke of Ivan.

"Though, I would enjoy burying my baby brother...for old times sake." His eyes slipped down, and he couldn't help noticing the torn shrt on the ground at Elata's feet...or the spectacle of seeing her without it. He fidgeted, for she was very beautiful to him.

"I know it's not Ivan. Glad you noticed!" she immediately beheaded the thing, kicking the head accross the site to make sure it didn't do something weird like merge back together. She stepped off of the body to make sure that it was dead then turned and leaped onto Michael, grabbing his face in her hands and giving him a big kiss on the lips. "Thank God you came! I was worried there for awhile!" She released the poor man quickly when she accidentally pressed her wounds against him. "owowowow! Oh no I got blood-" she stopped and laughed, pointing at his shirt. "you've got red on you." the joke was probably lost on Michael but oh well. She stepped back and began to pick some of the fingernail bits out of her wounds, wincing occasionally, seemingly unaware that her shirt was missing. "Is that what you got from loyalty?" she said motioning to the wolf. "It's really neat, thank it for me." she smiled up at him. "we should probably get to the hotel, I really need to wash these out. We also need to figure out what to do with the body now." she flicked the last peice of fingernail away. "Would you mind getting some trashbags and meetnig me at the hotel? I'm in 234."

Michael blinked. And then he blushed. And then he wobbled a bit, dazed to an extent, surprising for a large warrior of his status.

He wouldn't have gotten the joke, even if he had seen the movie*. His mind was to foggy all of a sudden to really understand. Elata had kissed him...pressed her chest against him...bare. Oh my. Oh my.

Michael's thoughts were quite scattered for a moment, until she spoke. He nodded, everything coming back into focus, his handsome and rugged face growing once more stern and recoling from Elata's affections. "Get yourself cleaned and healed if you can...once we are at the hotel we can discuss things further." He looked at the Wolf of Loyalty and nodded directly to it, to which it met his gaze. Then it turned to Elata, opening it's deformed mouth, and--

Licking her on the cheek playfully. It looked at her with familiar, bold brown eyes, then down sorrowfully at Ivan's body; as if it was familiar with the person who was dead.

(*SHAUN OF THE DEAD XP)

"Aww, dont' be sad," she said as she petted and hugged the creature. "My, you have some very beautiful eyes." she smiled kindly as she looked into them and then crossed her arms over her chest. "Can't go around in public like this I guess. Can I borrow your coat?" She thanked Michael as he handed it over and wrapped it around herself. It would do a good job of covering her wounds. They headed back to the hotel and she went straight into the bathroom to start cleaning herself. She picked a bit of fingernail or two out of her wounds she had missed and began washing them. "Wow this stings! Anyway, we need to get the body before someone else finds it. We can't be having any trouble. We should also leave the hotel soon probably. Oh! I got you a sandwich, it's on the floor but it's wrapped up it should be okay." She really wished she could lie down, but she had too much to do. She kept smiling as not to worry Michael though. As she bandaged herself she pitched her plan. They should eat quickly, she needed to pack, and then they should rent a car and move the body, and hurry up and head to The Misfits'. They could use trash bags to wrap it in, and it should be alright. Suddenly she began to feel light headed. Perhaps she had bled too much? She remembered that she had had a headwound awhile ago, maybe that had something to do with it. Also she had to take the pain medication for her too-she grabbed the sink as she swayed again. She shook her head and righted herself. "We should probably hurry. I think these past couple days are catching up with me!" she laughed and continued to smile as she wobbled around the hotel room to collect her things. This wasn't the time for her adrenaline to be wearing off.

A deep-set frown of concern engraved itself into Michael's face. Elata was badly wounded. And clearly running on very little energy.

"Miss Elata." Michael began with a certainty in his voice, which rose pridefully and handsomely in the back of his chest. "You are hurt, and running on empty. Allow me to carry your things and escort you to the Misfits' camp. I am sure they have set up medical supplies already."

The large and stony man was trying not to show his worry and fear for Elata, but everytime he tried to block the feelings from his mind, the image of her body pressed against his, and her kiss from before, reoccured within his mind. It was hard not to show emotion towards someone, now.

The Wolf of Loyalty pawed at Elata's feet and whined for her, it's brown eyes flashing with concern for her.

"Awww how sweet, but don't you worry, I'll be fine. It's good to push yourself you know, especially in this kind of work!" she petted the wolf and patted Michael on the shoulder as she gathered her things while eating. She handed Michael his sandwich off of the floor, "You'll want this, you're probably tired too." Elata was quite aware that she was about to fall over, but she meant what she said. She was by no means the strongest seeker, probably one of the weakest. She had to train her body and learn to operate under extreme duress and push her physical limits. If she didn't, the chances of her dying somehow were a lot higher. Especially if something like Muramasa showed up again, or even if Jude somehow reappeared. Since Ivan had been clearly dead, she assumed it had taken his body and probably do it to someone else again. She frowned and rubbed her jaw when she wasn't facing Michael though, it was starting to hurt again, but she didn't want to be any more drowsy than she was. She soon had her stuff together and quickly changed into a new shirt. "Alright! Let's get moving. I know I should rest but moving the body to avoid suspicion is much more important, so we'll go there first. Oh...I suppose we'll need a car though." she sat on the bed and got out a phone book. She flipped it open but everything blurred for a moment. She shook it off once again and called for a rental car. After that was arranged she took a moment to close her eyes and center herself. She needed to remain on her feet. "Well hey, I can wait for the car, if you want to run somewhere and buy some trash bags, or maybe we should wai...." she paused and blinked as things went out of focus again. " wait. It will be much less of a walk if we have the car. What do you think?" At this moment, her body decided it had had enough of her shit and chose to make her pass out. She fell forward onto the floor with a thump.