Chương 10: Chapter 9 – The Initiation Ceremony is a major event

On the fourth day, Cross casually announced that there was going to be an initiation ceremony we were all expected to attend. The training camp was apparently going to be really damn short, because we were doing well and the KSF needed us in the field.

"Transportation leaves at oh-eight-hundred Saturday. You will be in formal attire. You will conduct yourselves professionally. Each of you may bring one guest." She checked her clipboard.

"I need guest names by tomorrow evening for security clearance." After she dismissed us, the conversation started immediately.

"My girlfriend's flying in," Manuel said.

"She's never been to New York."

"I'm bringing my mother," Nadia added.

"She wants to see me in uniform." Torres smiled.

"My wife has been waiting for this. She's excited about the free food." Kara shrugged.

"I'll bring my brother, I guess. He's the only family I've got left." Liam was on his phone.

"My father will be there already, obviously. I'm bringing my girlfriend. We met at Yale." They all looked at me.

"O'Connor?" Torres prompted.

"Who's your plus-one?"

"I don't know. I didn't know there would be any ceremony in the first place." By how well prepared they were, they apparently talked about it earlier based on some rumor, and I just wasn't around. An awkward moment of silence followed. They only just realized they didn't tell me.

"You must have someone," Nadia said, brushing the whole not knowing aspect away.

"Family? Friends? A girlfriend?"

"I'll bring my girlfriend, most likely." They didn't look like they believed me. Especially Manuel, because as my roommate, he knew I wasn't texting or calling with anyone. They let it be, and we had more training. Today was… Wednesday? Not much of a notice for a Saturday ceremony. Who was I going to call though? I went through the afternoon exercises absentmindedly. My last resort was calling Takezo, an old friend of mine. He would come, it would be awkward, and everyone would forever think I was gay.

I waited for after the dinner with the phone calls. After I gobbled down the food, I rushed to my room, took my phone, and ran through the contacts. Okay, so the realistic last resort option was to text V to assign some junior agent to come play my girlfriend as a plus one. Or I could just hire an escort, that would come with less baggage. But I could do better. Lillith? No, my adoptive sister was on TV too often.

I doubted many people watched her preaching about how mankind needed to unite under the banner of Jesus Christ to fight off the kaiju, but still. Her propaganda was everywhere. I glanced out of the window, seeing a massive billboard with an underlit cross, a picture of an angel of light—Lillith—cleaving a kaiju in two with a blade of light, and a call to join the God's fight. Yep, still there. And she was probably going to be at the event anyway, on top of that. I dialed Kallisto.

The phone beeped, then told me the number I was calling was currently unavailable and invited me to try again later. Right, she was probably like a mile underneath the ground right now, so she had no signal. A heavy sigh escaped my lips. The good options were exhausted, so here came the bad ones. The first one was my mother. She would love to come, and would spend the entire evening gloating about how God put me on the correct path. A smirk crept onto my face as I stopped at Cassandra's number.

Bringing the unruliest high vampire alive to the ex-vampire-hunter organization's big event had a certain symmetry to it. I dialed her up. She picked up after a single beep.

"Peter?"

"Hey, Casey, how are things going?"

"I'm busy orchestrating the end of the world, so nothing much. What do you need?"

"I've joined the KSF and there's an initiation ceremony on Saturday. I need a plus one."

"You do realize that KSF is the same group of vampire hunters that has been hunting me and my family for all my life, right?"

"Yes, but I don't think anyone would actually recognize you. And even if they do, it'd be deliciously ironic." She sighed.

"No. First of all, I'm in the middle of the Pacific, and I am actually busy. Second of all, it's your ceremony, and you know how I am in public. I would steal all attention of everyone and everything, and then it would end up in a massacre. Third, they will recognize me. Fourth, it's Lillith's stupid ceremony, and I'm not giving her the satisfaction of showing up. And fifth, you wouldn't want me to come as your sister, would you?" Unauthorized duplication: this narrative has been taken without consent.

Report sightings.

"Well, no," I admitted.

"I need to bring a girlfriend to not look like a total loser."

"Bring Kallisto." She chuckled.

"Actually, no, never mind, that's a terrible idea. Hire some expensive escort to go with you. I'll foot the bill if you're broke. Or, I don't know, stop living like a total loser and build some human-to-human relationships? As a vampire, I can live like that. You really shouldn't." Touché. It still stung, especially from her. And I couldn't even accuse her of the same, because what she had with me counted as a friendship with a human.

It just didn't work in the other direction, and I had precisely one contact in my phone that had a human on the other side. My mother's.

"It's always great to be talking to you. Take care."

"You too. And really, hire an escort. Or go alone. It's not that bad. Just, don't call Ophelia, all right?" Hmph. That wasn't a bad idea.

"No worries. Thanks. Good luck with whatever you're doing." I hung up. If I brought an escort, someone like Manuel or Nadia or really anyone would take a picture of her, search it, and find it online. Any person I brought was going to come under intense scrutiny. But Ophelia was an excellent idea. Sure, she was the top-right corner of the hot/crazy chart, and she was also a high vampire. She was Cassandra's almost identically looking, just thirty percent hotter, and over five hundred years older, sister.

We had met for like five minutes in total, but she did manage to put her number into my phone with Intense Sex LLC as company on the contact in that time. Insane, yes, but she was also insanely hot, which made up for a thing or two. Plus, we met over a year ago, so maybe she calmed down a little in the meantime. I opened the contact, and wrote a text,'Hey, still want to mess with Cassandra?' She replied in an instant:'When I told you to text me later, I meant like the next day. Or later that week.

Not a year and a half later.'

'It's not like you age.'

'Fair enough, but I need to know if you mean it seriously. Send me a dick pic as proof you won't ghost me this time.' I slapped my face with my palm.

'You can't be serious.' No response. She wasn't going to talk to me without the buy-in. I called Kallisto again. To my surprise, the call connected.

"Peter?"

"Hey, Kallisto, you busy?"

"Yes. I am working on my power plant." I rolled my eyes.

"Right, so I'll be quick. I've got an initiation ceremony on Saturday, and I need you to come with me."

"Can't. I'm busy." She snapped that answer in a split second. Damn it.

"Look, I really need to come with someone, and we're living together, so you are the most appropriate person."

"Take one of your side bitches. My powerplant won't build itself." I sighed.

"I don't have any side bitches."

"That's not my fault, is it?" God fucking damn it. I rubbed my face with the palm, harder.

"Look, I'd appreciate if you acted like my girlfriend for once and came."

"I told you I don't do the girlfriend thing. I've been very clear that I expect you to devote your immortal soul to my divinity for the rest of eternity. You have yet to do that." Right because that was the normal relationship progression. One, hook up. Two, move in together and go on a long vacation. Three, devote my immortal soul to her for all eternity. Perfectly reasonable and normal.

"We've been through this. I'm just not quite ready for that."

"Your fear of commitment isn't my fault either." A heavier sigh escaped, again.

"All right. Fine. If I promise to devote my soul to you for the rest of eternity, will you come with me to the event?" A very awkward second passed. Another, too.

"I've got an alert, a wall in my dig is collapsing. Take care." She hung up. I fucking knew it. With a sharp breath, I texted Ophelia.

'I'm not sending any picture, but I'll owe you one even if we don't agree on anything. And I promise I won't ghost you this time.'

'Now, we're getting somewhere. Here're some pics of me to use for my profile on your phone.' She sent me two pictures of her. One, a really cute face-close up selfie, clearly to put as an avatar for her on my phone. The other, a picture of her lying in bed, clearly naked, just slightly covered by silk ropes, her head hanging from over the mattress's edge, the picture taken from the floor. Fuck, she was even hotter than I remembered her.

The type of hot that she had to turn off filters, because they made her look uglier. This was going to be a lot of fun, extremely weird, or both. I set that picture as the background for communicating with her.

'Thanks,' I sent back.

'Now, let's talk business.'

'Sure, what made you so desperate that you're texting me? We don't need to pretend that I wasn't the absolutely last option. Not even my family texts me unless they're utterly desperate.' Hmph, guilty as charged.

'I've got some kind of a big initiation ceremony at KSF coming up on Saturday. I need to bring a girlfriend with me to not look like a total loser.'

'Oooooh, that's going to cost you. You know who the KSF were, right?'

'I do. But you are the better vampire than Cassandra, so you can act normal, right?'

'But of course. So, to start, I need to ask a few questions. One, are you in a serious relationship, if yes then how long, with whom, and have you been faithful?' The Hell? I glared at the screen. I didn't expect this angle.

'I'm in a completely fucked up not-a-relationship with Kallisto.'

'I can live with that. Two, have you gained weight or suffered any disfigurement since we last met?'

'No. I've gained like twenty pounds of muscle since then, regenerated out of most of the scars, and that's about it.'

'All right. Now, for the event, I am willing to go there with you, but it has a few conditions. First of all, we will do a photoshoot after the event. You will do it with me without complaining, with perfect compliance. You will wear what I tell you to, pose how I tell you to, and take any and all pictures I ask for.' I expected that. After all, her interest in me was all about her wanting to mess with Cassandra.

Embarrassing pictures of how she's toying with me were just the right thing to get under Cassandra's skin, at least as far as I understood Ophelia's scheme.

'Yes, I will go along with that.'

'Second, I'm going as your girlfriend, and I'm getting the full boyfriend experience. From the first second we meet, which will be five minutes after sunset, until the next sunrise, you will act as a loving, obsessive boyfriend, and go along with everything I want.' I froze. Now it got weird. Just not in the way I minded.

'Sure,' I texted back.

'Third. You will wear absolutely no cologne.' Ah, she didn't want chemicals sprayed over her evening's meal. Well, she could drink me. I had no problem with it.

'I can do that.'

'You will come well rested, dressed appropriately to accompany me, and drink in a way that would in no way diminish your performance. You're not getting into a drunken fight, and you're also not giving me the 'I'm too drunk for sex' excuse later, understand?' Hmmm… she seemed to be kind of into it.

'Yes, ma'am.'

'No, it's yes, love. Or come up with some cute moniker. Girlfriend, remember?' Very into it.

'Yes, love.'

'Perfect, and finally, no masturbation or sex from now until the event. I want you ready for me.' I slapped my face with my palm. It almost ended up being a semi-normal exchange. I really needed to find some normal relationships.

'Sure.'

'Perfect. Pick me up at my penthouse in Manhattan. I'll send you the address.' I sighed. What did I get myself into?