Original -- The Bridegroom: Episode 4

[tierfal]

Title: The Bridegroom: Episode 4
Rating: PG-13
Word Count: 10,503
Warnings: language, sexual situations, blasphemy, inappropriateness
Prompt: Western, offensive and prim and proper, and 'The Smell of Trouble' at pulped_fictions
Summary: Belial drags the Bridegroom cast out to a fake mining town and coerces all of the candidates into filming an improvised Western. To say that this will end badly is understating matters a bit.
Author's Note: This may be disorienting without previous Bridegroom experience. XD Also, there's tons more on the way; it wouldn't fit in one entry! *dies* (Also, Episodes One, Two, Three, and Three-Point-Five. XD)


THE BRIDEGROOM: EPISODE 4
Even by the standards Belial has set with unparalleled vigor, this is a terrible idea.

Janine-the one in business school who keeps looking at Vincent like he’s a well-prepared filet mignon, even if that’s currently a well-prepared filet mignon dressed like some kind of Hollywood cowboy-glances at the rickety buildings looming out of the night.

“Didn’t you say we were going to Hawaii?” she asks.

Belial smirks. The red gleam of his eyes is one of the few reliable sources of light, mirrored eerily by the blinking red lights on the night-vision cameras. “I’m a demon, my slow-minded little pet. What I say and what I mean sometimes originate from entirely different linguistic families. And if lying wasn’t fun, you wouldn’t have led on half a dozen hunky jocks when you were in that sorority.” Janine goes a bit pale. “Now, then. As you can tell from the dashing Vincent’s extremely historically-authentic raiment, we are going to be undertaking a little project here.” He makes a small gesture with two fingers, and one of the cameramen zooms in on his face as he grins with just about all of the evil that an ancient and horrifyingly creative demon can muster. “We’re going to film an improvised movie.”

There’s a long silence.

Then Maia gasps. “You mean we’re going to be famous?”

“No, you idiot,” Belial says. “It’s just for the show.” Maia wilts, and Vincent almost reaches out to pat her shoulder. “And it’s almost certainly going to be an abomination.”

Vincent can’t argue with that.

“Wait,” Greta says, eyeing the silver star pinned to Vincent’s brown leather coat. “He’s supposed to be the sheriff, and the rest of us are all just… assorted chicks in some mining town? That sounds like an especially bad themed porno.”

“I was in a porn movie once,” Deandra confides, cozying up with Vincent’s right arm and dragging a finger down the lapel of his coat. “Want to know what I did?”

Extraordinarily desperate times call for extraordinarily desperate measures. Vincent closes his eyes.

Ah… hello? God? Um, yes, good evening. I know we haven’t spoken for a while-about two hundred and thirty years, give or take-but I’m in rather dire straits. I suppose it’s presumptuous to try to make arrangements with you, but if you get me out of this intact, I promise to turn over a new leaf or… something equally nice and virtuous. Yes? How does that sound? Give me a sign?

He opens his eyes. Deandra is massaging at his arm so avidly that he’s fairly sure he’ll bruise. There are no burning bushes in sight-no combusting foliage of any kind, in fact-and Belial’s hair has not suddenly fallen out.

Well, the kinds of people who discuss such things proclaim that God works in mysterious ways. If He has accepted the challenge, excellent; if not, Vincent’s no worse off than he was before.

“Jamaica runs the tavern,” Belial is saying, “Rosalie is the sheriff’s deputy, and Maia is the town prostitute.”

“I’m what?” Maia shrieks so loudly that Vincent’s ears ring.

Never mind.

As the rest of the girl-shaped bags of blood and tears and half-suppressed malice start off towards their ‘living quarters,’ already comparing the folded costumes they’ve been given, Maia storms over to Belial and fixes him with an impressively unintimidating glare. He just kind of wants to pat her head and tell her she’s a good puppy.

“What exactly do you think you’re doing?” she hisses.

“Oh, come on,” Belial says. “Even you must find it a little funny. And no, you can’t sew up the slit in your skirt.”

“That’s not what I mean,” Maia says, “although I intend to file a sexual harassment lawsuit the second this is over. I mean what do you think you’re doing here?”

Belial considers. “Standing,” he says, “in a fake gold-mining town a few miles from Placerville, surrounded by invasive cameras, my own sheer genius, and the stirrings of some exquisite female rivalry.”

Maia turns her glare briefly on the cameraman documenting their every move. He doesn’t look remotely intimidated either-slightly besotted, maybe; her pout is a work of art.

“I mean,” she says, “why are you putting Vincent into this situation? This is even more dangerous than Colorado, and you saw exactly what happened there.”

Belial beckons to the boy with the camera, who scuttles closer. Then he lays his open palm over the lens. It melts. The cameraman’s jaw drops, and a faint squeaking noise emerges from his open mouth.

“Listen,” Belial says. “Exactly what I’m doing is making television. I had nothing to do with the ridiculous gondola malfunction, but is having that thing fall from the sky good television? You bet your cute little ass it is. Is having the two of you freeze to death when we can’t even access the camera feed good television? No, which is why I tracked your aura and told the helicopter where to look. Is having Vincent get staked in the heart good television? Well, now…” He raises a finger before she can snarl at him adorably. “I’ve been giving that some thought. The trade-off is that it’s great entertainment, but if it happens before the finale, the rest of my season’s shot. So no, I don’t want Vincent dying just yet. But I want him damned close.” He smirks. “We’d just better hope he has an excellent guardian angel, wouldn’t you say?”

Maia’s eyes go a seething sapphire that makes Camera Boy gulp audibly and shuffle one step back. Then the blazing color fades, and she just looks like a tired girl hugging a bundle of fabric to her chest.

“Fine,” she says, and she turns to go.

Belial’s fairly sure he hears her mutter, “Still not as bad as the time I tried to save Yoko Ono’s soul.”

Maion is multitasking: for one thing, he’s struggling to determine whether there are any methods of messy retribution open to a celestial being who is essentially Good. For a second, he is glaring at the mirror and willing his reflection to change.

“Girl!” Jamaica cries. “You look damn fine!”

The endorsement rouses a few fragments of reassurance in Maion’s soul until he remembers that it comes from a woman who wears a lavender velour tracksuit with cranberry-colored Ugg boots on days when they won’t encounter Vincent.

“I look tawdry,” he says ruefully. “I’m afraid there are no two ways about it. On a scale of one to ten, with one being mostly harmless and ten being puts you on the fast-track to hell, where would you rate filling the pockets of Belial’s suit with live maggots?”

Jamaica stares at him. Maion fidgets with his skirt; it really is terribly breezy with the whole side open like that.

“Just a hypothetical question,” he says.

“Uh,” Jamaica says. “I… hey, I forgot! I’m supposed to give you this.” Slightly hastily, perhaps, she produces and proffers a piece of stationery ostentatiously stamped with the Bridegroom logo.

“Thank you,” Maion says, because the sinking feeling that he’s about to run face-first into another large and painful obstacle should not discourage him from politeness. He takes the paper in both hands, braces himself, and reads.

Suggested Lines of Dialogue for Town Prostitute
(kindly provided by your friend/master/overlord, Sir Belial, Esq. the First and Only)
1. Why, Sheriff, you must get tired of being so pure and upstanding all the time. Won’t you try sinnin’ for a spell?
2. Why, Sheriff, is that a six-shooter, or are you just happy to see me?
3. Why, Sheriff, have you got an empty cell and some spare handcuffs?
4. Why, Sheriff, you look mighty fine in that getup, but I reckon it’d look even finer on my floor.
5. Why, Sheriff, I’ll show you where to holster your gun.

Maion crushes the paper into a tiny, tiny ball despite the relative delicateness of his fist. Then, when Jamaica turns her back, he sets a bit of the fireplace kindling alight, tears the stationery into extremely small pieces, and pitches them all into the burgeoning flame.

This most definitely means war.

Vincent considers the fairly spartan accommodations of the sheriff’s office. A tug on the iron ring on the floor reveals that it is, as he had hoped, the handle of a trapdoor; there’s a nest of blankets in the hollow beneath, and if Rosalie settles the ugly patterned rug over the top, he thinks it’ll keep out the light.

“I suppose you’ll have to sleep in one of the cells,” he says.

“I think they’re bigger than my college dorm room,” Rosalie says in a tone that he christens stoic cheer. “According to the map, there are nicer bathrooms with showers and stuff out by the film crew’s tents.”

“Dreadfully considerate,” Vincent says, crouching to examine the underpinnings of the trapdoor. If he can wedge a two-by-four beneath the parallel bars of iron, he might be able to secure it from the inside.

Rosalie clears her throat uncertainly. “Is that…”

Vincent glances at her and follows the trajectory of her gaze to the semi-period pistol tucked into the back of his belt.

“That’s not a prop, is it?” she asks.

Vincent smiles grimly. “I’m still waiting for the shotgun to be shipped. If it’s drama Belial wants, it’s drama he’s going to get.”

Rosalie opens one of the cell doors, winces at the way the hinges creak, steps inside, and tests the cot. “This,” she says, “is also superior to my college dorm.”

“Remind me to purchase and renovate your alma mater one of these days,” Vincent says, shifting the rug over the trapdoor again. He stands, brushes off his hands-he would say he can’t believe that Belial has produced quasi-accurate dust and grime, but very little pushes the much-expanded boundaries of credulity anymore-and crosses over to the desk, above which are a series of mail slots that Belial had better not expect him to monitor.

“I wonder who exactly he expects us to arrest,” Rosalie remarks, prodding at the pillow a little, her as-yet-folded costume dropped beside her. “This isn’t the Ritz, but it’s really not bad as far as jails in the 1850s tend to go.” She blushes a little. “Well, that’s what I assume, anyway.”

“I was more interested in the railroad barons’ purses than the prisons,” Vincent says, picking up the sheets of Bridegroom stationery atop the desk blotter. “And if these instructions are to be believed, we’re supposed to arrest anyone who breaks character; acts publicly indecent; or disregards any ordinary laws, ‘such as thieving, trespassing, tearing other girls’ hair out, etcetera.’”

“I guess we’re probably supposed to encourage lying and swearing,” Rosalie says, grimacing a bit. “And drunkenness, probably, and catfighting.”

Vincent skims the rest of the page. “Those are all on the list. The venerable office of the sheriff also condones ‘stripping, to music or otherwise.’”

Rosalie stares, and Vincent feels a faint flush creeping up his neck-which is bad. Which is unacceptable, because two-hundred-and-fifty-year-old CEOs do not blush in front of little blonde humans, regardless of which words certain extremely thorough demons have put into their mouths.

“That’s what it says,” he manages, pointing to the page. “It says stri… never… mind. Why don’t I go scope out the town while you…” While we’re on the highly-successful topic of stripping, you should change into your costume, which is presumably extremely objectifying to emphasize a point which has already been hammered into my brain so many times that there’s nothing but pulp inside my skull. He clears his throat in the hopes that it will help him to make a start on clearing his head. “…get settled?”

Rosalie runs her fingers through the end of the pale braid hanging down over her shoulder and smiles at him. Either she’s too naïve to have noticed his indelicate scrabbling, or she’s too nice to give him an indication that she has. “Be careful out there,” she says-and is that tone… playfulness? He’s been thinking that Rosalie must have slipped through the cracks of Belial’s meticulous selection process, because brazen gold-digger is the most torturous demographic possible, but he may have to revise that opinion. It’s possible that Belial hand-picked Rosalie, too-knowing as he did that a subtle human being, with genuine emotions, would be twice as difficult to read as the painted women with their overstated pouts and plastered smiles.

Twice as difficult-and, perhaps, twice as dangerous.

Vincent tips his cowboy hat and moseys on out the door double-time.

Pat looks distinctly unimpressed as Belial hands her the list of women who will be sleeping upstairs.

“By tomorrow,” Belial says contentedly, “I expect that you’ll have it down pat.”

She raises an eyebrow at him and starts pushing her glossy lip out into a scowl.

“Oh,” Belial says, “I can’t stand it when people are angry at me-I’ll have to blame a patsy.” He gazes at her. “Surely there’s still a patina of joy left on this once-in-a-lifetime experience?”

“If almost all the girls are sleeping here in ‘my’ hotel,” Pat says, “why can’t Vincent?”

Belial shakes his head mournfully. “Pat, my love… I hate to patronize you, but it’s patently unsafe for the darling Mister Duval to seek his repose amongst half a dozen enterprising contestants who might see fit to violate him in his sleep in the misguided belief that it’ll better their chances of wooing him.” He pauses for a long moment. “All right, you caught me; I’d love to see that, but this place just isn’t sunlight-tight.” He sighs, feelingly. Mild regret tempered by excitement about the chaos that is to come is among his favorite feelings, although distilled schadenfreude always takes the top spot. “Alas and alack, such are perils of historically-accurate reconstruction.”

“I’m pretty sure these aren’t historically accurate,” Pat says, pointing to her red stilettos.

Belial blinks at her innocently. “If you keep your eyes peeled for such discrepancies,” he says, “you may see a pattern emerge.”

Pat frowns a little more.

“Pardon me,” Belial bids her. “I’m pat… hological.”

He pats her on the head and saunters back out of the hotel-which is also where meals will be served; he cut expenses by hiring a crap catering staff, the better to fit the cameras with sharper night-vision zoom lenses. He can’t wait to pinpoint all of the exact moments at which Vincent breaks into cold sweats, and he really can’t wait to broadcast them in high-definition and cause spates of fangirl swooning across the country.

He pays a visit to Greta’s general store next. He didn’t do enough Wikipedia research-or, more specifically, he didn’t describe hellish tortures in exquisite detail in order to make the editing staff do Wikipedia research and summarize it for him for quite long enough-to determine whether the jingly bell on the door is appropriately period, but he’s decided that he likes it. He’s also decided that he’s going to infest it with a tiny poltergeist or something so that it randomly starts ringing like crazy when there are no customers in sight.

“Good evening, my sweet,” he says. “No complaints here, I trust?”

Greta has set one elbow on the counter and propped her chin on it. Belial’s attentive empathetic instincts are noting that she may not be impressed.

“I busted my ass getting three degrees in part so that I wouldn’t have to work retail,” she says.

“In that case,” Belial says, “you shouldn’t have gotten three degrees in a field whose very name is spectacularly useless.”

Greta’s eyes narrow, and she stands up straight. “Archaeological History is-”

“Redundant,” Belial says contentedly. “Archaeology is the study of human history. You have three degrees in Human History History. You might as well have majored in Swedish, älskling.”

Greta sucks in a deep breath, presses her lips together, and lets it out slowly. Her hands on the counter are curled into fists, but when she speaks, her voice is level and disappointingly distant from the shrillness that would most likely precede a glorious hissy fit.

“Is anybody going to buy this stuff?” she asks, jerking her head towards the rows of shelves behind her. “Do they even have money?”

“Some of them do,” Belial says. “And some of them don’t.” Maia, for instance, is going to have to turn a few tricks or pick a few pockets, in anticipation of which Belial would be positively dying if that was demonically plausible. “Since the lot of you are pathetic, spoilt-rotten whiners, I’ll see if I can get you a shipment of the world’s tiniest violins.”

“I’m willing to bet I’m the only one who could play any kind of violin,” Greta says, somewhat darkly for a woman who should still be finding a patina of joy on this once-in-a-lifetime experience. How ungretaful. “Where did you find these girls? There’s barely a scrap of culture between them.”

“I think Maia still plays the harp,” Belial says, “as well as the ingenue. Maybe you should serenade Vincent some afternoon. May I humbly offer ABBA’s ‘Money, Money, Money’ as a song suggestion?”

Greta makes a face. The well-established empathy suggests that she may not be amused.

“‘The Winner Takes It All’?” Belial hazards next. “‘Voulez Vous’? Come on, they’re the most famous Swedes since Alfred Nobel, the poor bastard. And the IKEA guy. You’re probably too cultured to have seen one of my IKEA assembly manuals, which is a pity, because I’m proud of those.”

Greta is looking at him in his absolute least-favorite way-like he’s a rambling hobo who’s wandered in off the streets and might be carrying a rusty knife, rather than like he’s a Knight of goddamn Hell, thanks.

“You’re no fun at all,” he says. “I hope Vincent axes you this week.”

His spirits rise precipitously when he steps outside and sees Maia striding down the thoroughfare, holding the slit in her skirt closed with one dainty hand. She spots him, hesitates, and cowers a little, which makes his spirits hover somewhere in the stratosphere.

He nods to the low-cut cotton shirt and the bodice, both of which Maia tugs up slightly compulsively when she notices his gaze.

“You look delectable,” he says. “Also, if you make some ABBA arrangements for it, I’ll get you a golden harp.”

Maia seems dubious. What is it with the flagrant mistrust around here? Was it something he said?

“What’s the catch?” she asks slowly.

“If you keep going around looking like that,” Belial says, admiring the way a wavy lock of hair brushes at her collarbone, “probably that you have to sleep with me. There’s a distinct possibility that we’d set the bed-” Or bathtub, or billiards table, or limousine seat, or stretch of gravel. “-on fire, but that’s a risk I’m willing to take.”

Maia’s eyes flare so hotly that tiny tendrils of smoke emanate from her ears. To her credit, it’s somehow adorable instead of disturbing as fuck.

“Bite me,” she says flatly, hunching her shoulders and stalking off.

“I believe Vincent has dibs,” Belial calls after her, running his tongue over his teeth as he rates her ass a nine-point-five.

Honestly, as soon as he’s done ruining Vincent’s afterlife with this show, he’s starting another season with himself as the prize. If nothing else, his recent work has guaranteed that they’ll green-light it long enough for him to orchestrate a twenty-five-gold-diggers/one-demon orgy.

Just before he drools all over his Armani lapel at the very abstract thought, he hears footsteps and a histrionic sigh. Predictably, both belong to Carrie, the pouty little princess whose daddy has undertaken the longest corporate transaction known to modern man with Vincent’s company-apparently with the simple motive of making Belial want to victory dance through the streets of this artificial town.

“Hello, my pet,” Belial says warmly. “You look terribly glum. Can’t we turn that frown upside-down?”

“I… don’t know,” Carrie says. “It’s just-has he really bitten her? That basically means he’s chosen her as his mate, doesn’t it?”

Belial raises an eyebrow. “Exactly what crappy vampire erotica have you been reading? Evidently none of what I’ve written; I’ll give you the URL. In the meantime, suffice to say that the answer to your question is a resounding no. My voluble Vinny is a veritable Vesuvius of vim and vigor, to the inevitable consequence that he sometimes needs to feed. I don’t imagine he would nibble on just anyone, what with his being a dead man of discerning tastes, but it’s nothing quite that personal.”

Carrie’s eyes go from emo-with-a-chance-of-tears to emo-with-a-fragment-of-flickering-hope. Belial recognizes that, at this rate, he has about ninety seconds before she starts improvising poetry that heavily features the word feathers.

He straightens his tie. “That said… you, sweetheart, need to step up your game. You’ve got an excellent opportunity-he respects your father, in deference to which he’ll allow you to remain on this show for as long as he can. That gives you a good shot at winning him for eternity-” Her cheeks go pink, and her grip on the handle of her parasol tightens. He cast her as a boringly woebegone heiress here, too, because… he was running out of ideas. “-but you’re going to have to be more aggressive. He’s a predator, a businessman, and a secret sap. Most of all, he is ripe for the seducing.”

The girl’s mouth is set in an O that is, fortunately, not conducive to beginning any stanzas about metaphorical plumage. Belial half-bows and recommences swaggering along the dusty road. This evening was a wonderful success; now he can also look forward to some stunningly awkward advances from Carrie, which will push Vincent to never-before-seen extremes of exasperation.

After a moment of thought, Belial summons a cane to swing, because he is most assuredly a pimp.

The gall. The outrage. The effrontery. As soon as he’s done here, Maion is going to wreak huge, bloody vengeance on Belial. At the very least, he’s going to write a very angry letter and sign it with a frowny face.

In the meantime, it’s getting much too breezy in this silly outfit, so he finishes storming over to the seamstress shop he saw on the map at the tavern. The bell on the door jingles as he enters, although Naina doesn’t look up from where she’s sitting behind the counter, reading a magazine titled Ye Olde Cosmo.

Belial’s concept of historicity leaves something to be desired. Maion remembers the early 1850s rather differently, and apparently with many fewer high-heeled shoes.

Maion clears his throat, and the woman glances up at last.

“I’m terribly sorry,” he says, “but is there any chance you could add a few stitches to this?” He points to his scandalous skirt-which barely qualifies as a skirt, semantically speaking. Well, in any kind of speaking; it basically amounts to wearing a cape around his hips. “Even just one or two would help, since I think there are a grand total of four at the moment.”

Naina sets the magazine down and picks up a sheet of discouragingly familiar stationery. “Uh… nope. Not allowed. I can cast you out and call you a filthy whore, if you want; there’s a suggestion about it.”

Maion’s throat tightens at the very invocation of the word. This is going to be a long, long week. “Please don’t.”

Naina flips to the second page, which is attached with a very historically-accurate red paperclip. “I am allowed to give you new-and probably equally whorish-clothes from the back if you pay for them.”

…a long, long, long, long week. “I’ll… certainly consider that, thank you.”

It was worth a shot, although he expected Belial to have foiled him here as well. He takes a deep breath (or as deep a breath as he can manage in this annoying bodice-thing) and centers himself. He’s in a fragile human body, yes; he’s still experiencing some very unfortunate pains in his fragile human abdomen, yes; he’s the underdog in the fight for Vincent’s soul, yes; he’s subject to the humiliating whims of an arrogant and offensive demon, yes; but these are all obstacles that can-that will-be overcome with faith.

He sorts out a smile. He’ll show them. He’ll show them all.

“Is there something else?” Naina asks, reminding him that he’s standing at the door of her shop, staring into space and smiling to himself.

“No,” he says, ramping the smile up to a beaming grin in the hopes of spreading a little bit of warmth. “Thank you very much for your help.”

She looks at him funny, which makes him hesitate.

“You shouldn’t be here,” she says.

Maion’s pulse quickens until he can hear it in his ears like a hamster on a rattling wheel. “I-beg your pardon?”

“You treat this like some kind of tea party,” Naina says, her dark eyes narrowing. “You don’t need this. You could do that cutesy thing all day and get anything you wanted. Go play house somewhere else.”

The intensity of her gaze makes Maion take a step back-and wobble as his not-exactly-period stiletto heel narrowly catches the edge of the threshold. “I… I’m sorry, but I don’t-”

“I’m thirty-two, babe,” Naina says, so coldly that Maion has to resist snapping back Well, I’m approximately four-and-a-half billion… ‘babe.’ “I’ve gotten divorced twice, I have a six-year-old son, and I’ve been on unemployment for eight months. You think I’d stoop to a questionable reality show with a dead bachelor if it wasn’t my last resort?”

Maion wants to hate her. She called him a bitch last week and a whore this week-well, indirectly, but it still hurts-and she told him that pancakes would make him fat. The fact of the matter is that she just hasn’t been very nice, but…

But now that he’s looking, he can see the lines cracking the makeup at the corners of her eyes, and all he can think about is how adorable a six-year-old with those dark brown eyes would be.

Gosh darn it.

He takes an even deeper breath, wheezes a little when the bodice constricts his lungs, coughs unglamorously, and steadies himself on the doorframe.

“Do you play the lottery?” he asks.

Naina scowls. “Of course not.”

“Well,” Maion says, “you should start.”

Before she can call him back and demand to know what he’s been putting in his crackpipe (he’s learned so much about how people talk these past few weeks!), he slips out the door and starts towards the edge of “town.” Ever since he read Kylie’s mind, he’s been able to sense her aura-although that certainly doesn’t mean that he has to like where it’s leading him.

He hesitates at the black, gaping mouth of the gold mine. Even in a human shape, he’s retained most of his seraphic sensibilities, and that includes an aversion to the earth.

Not the Earth, of course, but spaces inside of it-holes, trenches, graves. Spaces beneath it. Spaces underground, so many steps closer to the underworld. Anything subterranean makes him claustrophobic to the point of nausea: caverns, bunkers, subways… mine-shafts.

The timbers shoring up the entrance don’t look terribly firm, and Maion starts to wonder, in earnest, how much time and money went into building this little village of façades. How safe is this-is any of this? It was different when he and Vincent went spelunking, because there were lights and cameras and lots of reassuring signage, and it was a national park with rangers and safety officers, and then there were cute little bats, and-well, having Vincent there didn’t hurt, either. But this…

He staggers a few steps back from the soundlessly-yawning doorway to oblivion, not exactly aided in his quest for stability by the combination of high heels and the dirt road, and leans against a fencepost, pushing his hair back and gasping a bit. It’s okay. He’ll be okay. He hasn’t gone in; even if he had, Belial wouldn’t risk the insurance fee fiasco that would result if it was liable to collapse. And Kylie will be fine; she won’t get buried under tons of rubble, suffocated in Belial’s element, pressed closer to the flames of his domain-

Maion has to sit down. Unsurprisingly, the rather-less-than-a-skirt is not particularly conducive to that end; he has to wrap it around his shins before he can hug his knees without giving anyone on the road a good look at his underwear. Despite the fact that these are the really cute sky-blue-with-clouds panties, he doesn’t fancy sharing them with the world at large.

Speaking of sky, he tilts his head back and bites his lip, looking at the stars. It’s not very fair that he has to grapple with the phobias of a Being of Light and Air even though the benefits are dwindling quickly as he lingers here. Shows what Naina knows-Maion’s playing an increasingly dangerous game.

He consults the constellations for a while. They prove fairly unhelpful, but that could be because Maion learned everything he knows about astrology from newspaper horoscopes. He’s about to give up and go ask Jamaica to make him a (very period) virgin strawberry daiquiri when he feels Kylie’s aura shift, and then there’s a yellow light moving towards him from the mine.

He scrambles to his feet just as Kylie and another blonde girl-Bri-emerge from the mine. Judging by the half-unbuttoned flannel shirts and form-fitting jeans, Belial has elected to give everyone a fair chance at sexy outfitting regardless of the professions he assigned them, which is remarkably equitable for him. Kylie’s holding a lantern in one hand, and she grins as she sees Maion.

“Hi, there, gaijin!” she says.

Maion blinks. “I… isn’t that Japanese?” Unless his Gift of Tongues has failed, his closest female friend just called him a foreigner.

“Yup,” Kylie says contentedly. “It’s on my list of instructions that I’m supposed to say it as often as possible, because clearly all individuals of Asian descent are fresh-off-the-boat Japanese, despite the fact that the vast majority of the Asians that came during the gold rush were from mainland China.”

“I don’t think Belial researched very thoroughly,” Maion says, which is definitely the understatement of the day.

“I think he opened a history book and spat in it,” Bri says cheerfully.

Kylie sets the lantern down, catches Maion’s right hand, and opens his fingers. “He did, however, bury us a bunch of little presents.” She sets a shiny rock the size of a walnut in Maion’s palm. “It’s probably pyrite instead of the real thing, but since none of the girls are geologists, happy Chinese New Year.”

“Thank you,” Maion says solemnly.

“Are you okay?” Bri asks. “We were going to try the restaurant for some authentic hamburgers or something; you should come.”

Maion tucks the probably-pyrite nugget safely into the pocket just inside the waist of his not-skirt. “I’d like that,” he says. He can’t help following the line of the flannel back up to Bri’s face-halfway there, he sees the little gold cross she wears on a chain. “Oh! I didn’t know you were…” He points. “Isn’t that going to be a little… challenging… when it comes to marrying a vampire?”

“Well,” Bri says, “I’m only wearing it until my parents have paid for my wedding-whenever that is, I mean. I don’t have any delusions about this whole thing; I’m just hoping they zoom in on my boobs enough that guys start paying attention to me again.”

“Why did they stop?” Maion asks, mystified. Bri seems perfectly…

…bald underneath the blonde wig she just lifted off of her head.

“I had bone cancer,” Bri says, settling it again and tucking a few strands of hair behind her ears. “I guess most people would have more faith in God after surviving something like that, but if another person tells me that the shit I went through was His way of testing my resolve, I’m going to break a crucifix over their head.”

There’s a long silence, which Maion spends crying on the inside. Kylie shoots a worried look his way.

“Sorry,” Bri says brightly. “I’m totally socially awkward after talking to nobody but hospital staff for so long. I’m also starving, come on!”

She links her arms through one each of Maion’s and Kylie’s and starts towing them towards the hotel. It’s not a long enough walk to do much imploring of the heavens, but Maion packs in as much as he can.

Vincent is just trying to find some peace. Just a quiet place in the shadows somewhere; a nook or a cranny or a fake alleyway in which he can fan himself with his cowboy hat until the gray flush currently threatening his ears fades back to normal. He’s also on the lookout for stray two-by-fours, or for portions of the recently-constructed building façades from which two-by-fours can be ripped without overly compromising their structural integrity, but not succumbing to shame is his first priority for now.

Shame. What a concept.

Deandra, who is dressed in the kind of sexy nun costume that has made Vincent consider firebombing Halloween stores, latches onto his arm three-point-two seconds after he’s stepped out into the road and begins dragging him towards the church.

“Start thinking sinful thoughts,” she purrs, “and I’ll get on my knees for you.”

Vincent wishes he could remember what personal space feels like. “You can’t bring me into a church,” he says.

Deandra toys with the white satin ribbons trailing from her headband, which appears to be designed to evoke a wimple if one is charitable, imaginative, and squinting. “Why not?”

Vincent stares at her for a long, long moment, but she seems serious. “I’m… a… vampire…”

She blinks. It’s something of a marvel that she can actually raise her eyelids with that much mascara on. “I know.”

“Crucifixes? Holy water? ‘The power of Christ compels you’? Ringing any bells?” He watches her continue blinking. She must have extraordinarily strong muscles around her eyes, but the belfry appears to be cavernously empty. “…right. Suffice to say I’m much more comfortable out here, but thank you for the invitation.”

Deandra tilts her head slowly, possibly as a result of the fact that her earrings appear to be giant plastic angels. Vincent hates to admit it, but he actually prefers the flesh-and-Quintessence kind. “But… there wasn’t anything about church stuff in the book.”

Vincent sighs. “The Book, like most of its proponents, prefers not to acknowledge our existence any more than nec-”

“And aren’t you supposed to sparkle?” Deandra says. “I haven’t seen much sparkling.”

Vincent is going to grind a handful of glitter into each of her over-made-up eyes, and then she’s going to see all the sparkling she could ever want.

“If you’ll excuse me,” he says, “I’m going to figure out what the contract says about suicide.”

He already knows that there’s a prohibition beginning on page twenty (and continuing for several thousand words) detailing all the ways in which he isn’t allowed to incapacitate himself and/or intentionally cause his own hospitalization, and the general suicide sanction is squarely at the top of page three, but the cameras have ingrained a one-liner parting-shot habit that he can’t quite break.

He attempts to extricate his arm from Deandra’s grip, but she digs in with her manicured fingernails. Vincent is positive that he has ever seen a nun whose nails were painted black with white crosses, and a hiss slips from between his clenched teeth at the way they’re burning him even through his shirt.

“Wait!” Deandra wails. “The church has a graveyard!” Vincent does not even want to know how and from what material sources Belial built a fake cemetery. “We can do it there! It’ll be filthy, and we’ll desecrate the graves, and we can make some voodoo magic-”

“You win the Worst Euphemism of the Day award,” Vincent says, fighting the ebb and flow of hellfiery agony as she scrabbles for his hand, and her nails graze his flesh. “Your prize is that you let the fuck go of me before I tear you to pieces.”

Deandra blinks at him. “You mean… with an orga-”

Vincent swallows a scream, which sticks unpleasantly in his throat, hauls his arm out of her clutches, darts off at vampire speed, and melts into the shadows beside the nearest building before she can pick out the gleam of the silver star pinned to his chest.

Breathe. He has to breathe. The deep, wicked pain that had been starting to boil his organs as she pressed the painted crucifixes into him is receding, and he escaped in plenty of time to recover. The question now is whether she’s the one hell-bent on his destruction, or if she’s just incredibly stupid. Unfortunately, the latter would make a brilliant disguise if the former was the truth.

A warm hand insinuates itself into his, and he jumps like a startled cat-which settles it; he has to get out of here before the rest of his dignity dries up and dies à la trapped spider.

“You don’t look well,” one of them-Janine? Janine-says. He’s about to remind her that he’s been dead for almost as long as America has been a sovereign state when he sees the rather unsubtle caduceus temporary tattoo situated between her collarbones.

“I hope you’re the kind of doctor who has a time machine,” he says faintly, “such that I can go back a month and put myself out of my misery before it began.”

“That’d be a paradox,” Janine says smoothly, tugging on his arm. “Come on, let me make you feel better.”

Vincent resists, wishing he could pull hard enough to dislocate her shoulder, but there’s a very spoilsportish bit on page eighty of the contract disallowing any undue violence perpetrated on contestants, no matter how accidental it looks. “Unless I can take that to mean that you’re either going to erase the last three weeks from my memory or pour me a very stiff drink, no, thank you.”

“I have whiskey,” Janine says, her hands climbing up his arm. He’s not entirely sure what’s so enticing about his shoulder, but he doesn’t think he wants to know what she’s planning when she reaches it. “Would that put you in a slightly… looser… mood?”

Vincent has figured out what this fake town needs: a set of stocks. Eleven sets of stocks, actually, so that he can slap them all in and keep an eye on them without having to look over his shoulder constantly for an incoming stake.

“If I get into a loose mood,” Vincent says, “I’ll forsake my better judgment, shred the contract into semi-microscopic paper fibers, burn them, hurl the ashes into a large body of water, and spit on them as they sink. At that point, I’ll be damned for eternity, and the show will end on a very abrupt note, and I haven’t the faintest idea what will happen to all of you.” If any justice remains in the world, they’ll all be committed to mental institutions that suit their respective brands of lunacy, but Vincent long ago gave up assuming that the world was fair. He gave up for good three weeks ago; his current philosophy is more along the lines of Reincarnation must be real, and I must have been a serial-killing axe-murderer of children and puppies in a previous existence.

Janine frowns, which at least is significantly better than blinking at him and referencing the Pile of Paper with the Sparkly Things. Then she gives him a slow, smoldering, slightly evil smile, which is almost attractive.

“Are you sure there isn’t anything else I can give you to drink?” she asks, flipping her hair back over her shoulder to expose her neck.

Her carotid artery throbs invitingly, and the smell rises off of her now that he’s focused on it-warm iron and salt twining with the reasonably classy musk perfume dotted underneath her ear. Her pulse quickens as she tries to analyze his expression; he almost can’t help but to admire a woman who calculates even as she submits herself to a vampire’s fangs.

He also can’t help but to admire what a prime opportunity this would make for drawing him close and thrusting a stake up through his ribs.

His voice emerges low and with a raspy edge that seems to be the reason goosebumps rise on her half-bared shoulder. “Perhaps another time.”

He turns swiftly from her disappointment, just in case she determines that stabbing him through the back would also be sufficient for her potentially inimical ends, and starts back for the sheriff’s office. There was a narrow staircase at the back of the room, which he hadn’t had any interest in testing at the time; now, however, the small balcony perched alongside the attic above the jail cells sounds like an excellent place to retreat and regroup.

As he had expected and half-feared, Rosalie looks desperately adorable in the deputy outfit that Belial was so obliging as to provide. She’s redone her hair in two braids and looped a red bandana around her neck, and she looks up from digging through a steamer trunk to smile at him as he steps in.

“We’re stocked with twelve pairs of handcuffs,” she reports brightly, a rosy tinge in her cheeks, “three of them pink and fuzzy. Apparently that’s all we need to enforce the law.”

“I may file a request for tasers,” Vincent says. “Have you been upstairs?”

She shakes her head, which makes her braids bounce insufferably cutely, so he leads the way. As he’d expected, it isn’t much, but it’s quiet, it’s reserved enough that he won’t be assaulted with extremely bad attempts at seduction at every turn, and it offers them an unimpeded view of the dusty road that runs through their dismal town.

“I think Belial should have specified a basic plot for this film,” Vincent says. “I can only imagine that it’s going to dissolve into sheer chaos as soon as the cameras start rolling tomorrow night.”

“You’re the protagonist,” Rosalie says. “You can make one up as you go along.”

Vincent smiles thinly. “I’m not sure I’d race to the theater for the midnight premiere of The Sheriff with the Slightly Checkered Past Who Rebuffs Various Unappealing Sexual Advances.”

“Come on,” Rosalie says warmly. “We can’t be all bad.” She watches him out of the corner of her eye, hiding a grin. “If I didn’t know any better, I’d say that you almost liked Maia.”

“She tastes amazing,” Vincent says.

He pauses.

He folds his arms on the banister and buries his face in them.

Rosalie pats his shoulder. “Don’t worry. I think admitting your attraction is probably healthy.” She hesitates, and a glance confirms that she’s looking at the gun again. “But I… I mean, are you sure you can trust her?”

Vincent smirks a little. Tragically, he’s getting out of the habit of doing it properly. “I’m sure,” he says. “Suffice to say… she reminds me of someone.”

The dusty streets-well, street-of Yucca is dark and silent when the sun goes down. The camera zooms in slowly, almost caressingly, on the main square, where the tavern and the hotel face each other, staring down on the center of this gritty, grubby town with blank windows like judging eyes.

A tumbleweed rolls across the emptiness, shadow cast by the gas lamps swinging in the gust of arid wind. A lone harmonica wails, and then-footsteps. A pair of boots; old, solid leather, and the soft jingle of silver spurs.

The camera pans back smoothly as the footsteps pause and then continue, and the sheriff strides into the frame. Held for a moment between the mirrored gleaming of the unseeing windows, he stops again, gazing around him at this heap of sin and plywood that calls itself a town-that calls itself his town. He’s going to bend this place to the law or to his will, whichever comes easier, or he’s going to die trying.

He looks up at the fat full moon, like a new quarter floating on the satiny black pool of the sky. The wind tousles his long, dark hair, and he lifts his hand to touch a knuckle to the brim of his hat, tilting it back, soaking in the starlight. Deeply he contemplates… violent homicide, sour lemonade, or possibly infected mosquito bites.

“Cut!” Belial calls through his megaphone, which says TYRANT in what he assumed were fairly unambiguous letters on the side. He pushes his beret back and sighs loudly. “What part of ‘wistful and brooding with a touch of badassery’ did you fail to understand?”

“Your appalling lack of directorial ability aside,” Vincent says, “you said we were supposed to improvise.”

“I changed my mind,” Belial says. “I’m entitled to subject you to my whims. Page three, clause-”

“Four, section one,” Vincent says. Belial is impressed enough to forgive the comment maligning his incomparable artistic talent. “If you’re going to treat me like an actor, I want a trailer and a personal assistant. And a taser.”

“I’m not treating you like an actor,” Belial says, through the megaphone again, which makes Vincent wince slightly in a way he likes. “I’m treating you like a slave, because your ass-or your soul, and by extension your corporeal ass-is mine until you get hitched.”

Vincent grits his teeth, which can’t be good for his fangs. Honestly, the boy never thinks of the HD broadcasts and the teen girls with TiVo who will replay shots of his face frame-by-frame. “Pray tell precisely how one conveys ‘a touch of badassery.’”

“Less bitching,” Belial says, “more emoting. I expect the charm to ooze like an infected mosquito bite.”

Vincent appears to be suppressing his gag reflex. Definitely the violent homicide, then.

Belial settles in his director’s chair, which reads SUPREME EMPEROR OF ALL HE SURVEYS across the back. He’d say that it’s a good night to be him, but that’s been true every night since the dawn of time.

For all of his sniveling, Vincent does a rather fine job of embodying Belial’s soul-shatteringly brilliant vision, and the first scene is all that matters anyway; award committee bribes take care of the rest. So when Vincent’s been standing around in the moonlight channeling Clint Eastwood to Belial’s satisfaction, and his shout of “That’s a wrap!” leads his leading vampire to mutter, “I need a drink,” he’s all too happy to pick up his emperor’s chair and follow Vincent into the tavern.

“Why, good evening, Sheriff,” Jamaica says in a sultry voice, cocking her hip and toying with a very clean dishrag. “What can I get for you tonight?”

“A lobotomy,” Vincent says. “Failing that, liquor will have to do.”

Jamaica giggles as if she actually processed the four-syllable word. “Liquor I can handle, Sheriff.” Deftly and with no small amount of flair, she pours him a shot of whiskey and pushes it across the bar, leaning over the counter to murmur, “This one’s on me. Later, you can do body shots off me.”

Vincent opens his mouth, presumably to say something along the lines of Are you sure you want to go to hell in a handbasket when you know that it’s populated by creatures like our director?, but then his eyes dart towards the nearest camera, and Belial can actually see him reviewing the contract for clauses that disallow sabotaging moments of gold-diggery. His blue eyes darken as he realizes that breaking the fourth wall would allow Belial to spend the remainder of eternity breaking his immortal soul, focuses on Jamaica again, and clears his throat.

“I think that would qualify as abusing my position of authority,” he says.

“Baby…” Jamaica looks at him through her eyelashes. “You can abuse me all you like.”

Belial has to admit that he’s never seen anyone down a shot quite so desperately.

“Have you seen my deputy?” Vincent asks, sliding the empty glass smoothly back to Jamaica. “I think it’s time we headed out to investigate wrongdoings and whatnot.”

Jamaica frowns. “Rosalie? Nope.” She lifts the glass and touches her glossy lip to the edge. “You sure I can’t get you another drink, sir?”

“It’s 1852,” Vincent says. “We still believe that saliva can transmit venereal disease.” He starts for the door, raising a hand; half of the cameras swivel to track him, and the other half stay trained on Jamaica’s face, at which beauty Belial silently punches the air. “I’m going to take my chances with the dysentery-ridden water at the hotel.”

There’s a pause while the saloon-style doors flap back and forth, and then the cameramen glance at Belial for confirmation before they go scurrying after the vampire in the cowboy hat.

“Did he just call me a whore?” Jamaica asks.

“Yes,” Belial says, grabbing her hand and kissing each of her knuckles in turn. “But I’m going to counterfeit you an Oscar.”

If Vincent swaggers into the hotel, it’s only because these boots are starting to pinch.

“Someone please tell me that Rosalie wasn’t tied to the train tracks while I was-” In makeup. He can sense the cameras behind him; he’s starting to feel their greedy, sucking eyes every time they close in on him, feeding his humanity out to the voyeurs clip by clip. He would give his liver to turn around and tell the audience who the leech here really is, but he should probably keep that organ around, especially since every other woman seems to be furnished with a supply of whiskey. “-thinking deep thoughts about horse thieves and claim-jumping.”

…on second thought, he should be very careful about using the word “jump” or any variations thereupon until this ordeal is over.

Suddenly there is cleavage in his face. Vincent knows for a fact that push-up bras were not a presence in 1852.

“Sheriff, honey,” Pat says warmly, reaching for his belt buckle (he prays). “Don’t you worry about her; why don’t I fix you up-”

“I don’t need to eat,” Vincent says. Whatever distinctly un-contemporary body spray she’s showered in is making his eyes water.

“I’ll cook something up special, just for y-”

“No,” he says, prying her fingers off of his belt, “I literally don’t need to eat. Physically. I’m just looking for Rosalie.”

“Stop molesting him for a second,” Kylie-the-Chinese-one-who-Maia-likes says to Pat, which immediately earns her three Not a Gold-Digger points-which is really rather funny, given her costuming. “You mean Rosalie’s missing?”

“I don’t know yet,” Vincent says. “This is only the second place I’ve looked.”

Bri, who has up until now mostly been the Other Other Blonde, stands up and joins Kylie. “Then we should hurry our asses up.”

Four Not a Gold-Digger points to the woman wearing the… small gold cross, which makes Vincent slightly dizzy just to look at.

“Could you take that off?” he asks, gesturing to it vaguely.

…a mite too vaguely, judging by the plaid shirt that immediately winds up on the floor.

“I can arrest you for public indecency,” he manages.

Bri smirks and holds her arms out, wrists together. “Clap me in irons.”

“I can also arrest you for sassing the sheriff,” Vincent says, which isn’t true but should be. Fortunately, Belial hasn’t sauntered in to call him on his shit. He turns to Kylie, looking her in the eyes, as he finally finishes shaking Pat off of his arm. “I’m going to try the office. Let me know if you see her.”

Kylie salutes, winks, picks up the abandoned shirt, snorts, and throws it at Bri. Vincent can now see why Maia likes this one.

He sweeps out past the cameramen before another woman can fling her clothes onto the floor to get his attention, which is as much for the preservation of their dignity as it is for the sake of his sanity. He’s only made it two steps into the street before a hook made of a very solid wood snares his elbow and yanks him into the narrow alley between the hotel and the empty façade to the right. Before Vincent can demand to know what fuckery is being foisted on him this time-and presumably to get censored to the point of incomprehensibility in the final edit-the parasol that just left an imprint on the inside of his arm is pressed against his throat, and someone is French-kissing him poorly.

When he maneuvers to wedge a hand under the starchy ruffles of the parasol, he starts out by removing the pressure from his esophagus and then shoves hard enough that his assailant stumbles back, ceasing to pollute his mouth with her tongue. By that point, his brain has become so oxygen-deprived that the only thing he can think of to say is “I am not the inside of a yogurt container when you forgot to bring a spoon!”

Not one of his most eloquent rejections, but he supposes it’ll get the job done. A quick glance to the side, partly in the hopes of discovering a miraculous exit, confirms that one of the more adventurous cameramen has documented this experience. Since the world isn’t fair enough to send the young man wandering along a cliff’s edge and dropping the footage without coming to any real harm, Vincent hopes instead, rather resignedly, that he at least gets promoted for his quick zoom-button finger and extremely strong stomach.

“But you’re French,” Carrie is saying. “You’re supposed to like French kissing. It’s supposed to be romantic.”

“‘Supposed’?” Vincent pauses to cough a little more air into his beleaguered lungs, beyond hope of similarly reviving his traumatized consciousness. “What does that word even mean? By all rights, I’m supposed to have died in a Parisian gutter in 1778, which would have been the well-earned end of my human life. Or, if you prefer, I’m supposed to frolic around remote regions of Transylvania preying on the occasional virgin, since that’s the traditional due of the monster I was made into. And if all of that’s just too predestined for you, I’m supposed to be back in San Rafael, sending angry emails to my insipid employees, because what I chose to be was a businessman. Nowhere in the grand or small scheme of things am I supposed to enjoy being sexually assaulted in the name of reality television thinly disguising profit as contrived romance!”

He drags in a deep breath and lets it out. Amazingly, he actually feels better after the rant-not that any of it is going to make it into the final cut of the ‘film’ after that conclusion, but he wouldn’t put it past Belial to assemble an outtakes reel.

Now that Carrie’s stepped a little bit into the light, he can see the way her eyes fill, her lip wobbles, and her cheeks flush. There’s no way around it: she’s going to cry. And then he’s the villain.

Vincent says something unprintable in French, storms across the road, and slams the door to the sheriff’s office so hard behind him that the doorknob falls off.

Even a morsel of needless destruction soothes the latest gashes in his mutilated ego, so he’s significantly calmer by the time he has rescued the smartphone that he smuggled onto the set and then hid inside the pillowcase of his vampire den. He quietly thanks engineers’ drive towards eventually making technology invisible to the naked eye as he conceals it in his palm and his sleeve, climbs the stairs, and steps out onto the balcony, where-as he’d hoped-he can glean a little bit of cell network service. He leans back against the railing, somewhat carefully given the doorknob incident, in a way that can probably be mistaken for a good, long, Western brood. Then he dials Thompson at home, activating the speakerphone.

Two rings later: “Hello?”

“It’s me.”

“Ah,” Thompson says, which is politer than I know. “How is the Central Valley? I believe the last time I ventured to set foot there was in 1981.”

“Evidently you learned the lesson it’s intent on teaching me,” Vincent says, “which is to avoid it at all costs.” He takes a deep breath. “I called to ask a favor: I need you to finish the deal with Felbough. I don’t care what it takes, and you can have anything you want if you pull it off-any bonus you can dream up, my right kidney, a private island; I don’t care. Just make it happen.”

There is a pause. “You do realize that I’m going to ask for a pony.”

“If you close with him,” Vincent says, “I’m going to give you an entire fucking ranch.”

“As long as it’s not in the Central Valley,” Thompson says. “I’ll see what I can do.” Coming from Thompson, that means It will be done in twenty-four hours, better than you could have done it yourself, and I will brush imaginary dust off of my shoulders. “Can I ask why the matter became so urgent?”

Vincent tries to think of a way to make his part in the latest fiasco sound slightly less absurd, not that Thompson won’t see straight through even the most obfuscating description. “Things… were said. By me. The phrase ‘sexual assault’ may have been uttered, somewhat loudly, to the daughter of an important transaction partner.”

As predicted, he recognizes that cough as the one that always covers Thompson’s desire to laugh uproariously.

“The point is,” Vincent says distinctly, “that I want her off the show, you want at least one pony, and the two of us can both achieve those goals if you come through.”

“You should start brainstorming pony names,” Thompson says. “Goodnight, Mister Duval.”

“Goodnight, Alistair. And godspeed.”

Satisfied that a modicum of sanity still clings to the world, Vincent is smiling as he hangs up. At least, he is until he sees that Thompson just played JONQUIL on a triple-score tile in Words With Friends.

With one disaster averted, he returns the phone to its temporary home beneath his pillow, hangs his hat on the hook by the cells, and then climbs back up to the balcony with the town map in hand, the better to assess his options from above. From this height, he can tell which buildings are actually three-dimensional, for a start; the wind is clearer, too, which allows him to detect…

The smell of trouble: pomegranate shampoo and clean, sweet O-negative.

Cameraman in tow, Maia wanders into sight, strumming at what appears to be a lyre coated in gold spray-paint. She pauses below the balcony, looking up at him, and chews on her lip for a moment, and then the aimless plucking resolves itself into a tune that he knows but can’t quite place. It summons half-formed memories-fuzzy images and print headlines and radio static; Thatcher, Khomeini, Carter; a tsunami in Nice, the independence of Saint Vincent and the Grenadines, the end of smallpox (finally). It’s a trilling, identifiable riff; he can see a windowpane, the rain beyond it, his own face reflected and smirking wryly. Then he remembers, just as Maia starts to sing.

“There’s not a soul out there… No one to hear my prayer…”

Vincent hadn’t realized that lyres could be, for lack of a better word, awesome. ‘Awesome’ beats the living hell out of ‘discotastic,’ which was his second choice.

“Gimme, gimme, gimme a man after midnight-won’t somebody help me chase the shadows away? Gimme, gimme, gimme, a man after midnight-take me through the darkness to the break of the day…”

He also hadn’t realized that there exists such a thing as a lyre solo.

Vincent tucks the map into his back pocket and folds his arms on the railing. “You’ve got my attention,” he says. Maia beams up at him, confirming his suspicions that she doesn’t realize he can see down her shirt. “Wait there a minute,” he says. “I feel like Juliet, which the last three shreds of my dignity have deemed unacceptable.”

He opens the door for her when he gets downstairs.

“Where’s your knob?” she asks.

There’s a pause, and they stare at each other across the threshold. Then her cheeks go violently pink.

“Darn it,” she says. “It’s this darned outfit. It’s really ha-difficult not to make everything sound like a bad innuendo.”

Vincent makes the conscious decision not to rise to th… shit, it’s contagious. “What are you supposed to be, a questionable troubadour?”

Maia frowns very deeply.

“Oh,” Vincent says, remembering the role assignments again. “Well, where did you get that?”

A faint buzzing sound indicates that the cameraman is zooming in on the lyre, although that might be primarily because Maia clutches it to her chest when Vincent points it out.

“I, um… bargained… for it,” she says.

Vincent knows for a fact that he doesn’t like the sound of that, because it-like almost everything on this wretched excuse for a film set-has Belial written on it in large block capitals. “Let me guess,” he says. “He handed you something, and as soon as you’d taken it, he demanded that you return the favor and give him what he wanted all along.”

The cameramen have been either well-trained or well-threatened; this one manages to stop focusing on Maia’s chest in time to catch the flash of guilt on her face. “I-well, I-” She gives up on speech and makes a noise of great distress, after which she sets the lyre on the desktop and hangs her head.

“Give me some verbs,” Vincent says.

He’s expecting a lecture on how he should show his appreciation for unsung part-of-speech heroes like indefinite articles. He is not expecting Maia to launch herself at him and kiss him in fervid desperation, burying both hands in his hair and curling all ten fingers in it tightly.

[Episode 4.5]