He was incredibly nervous,however, which led to him dragging his feet about the whole thing. He used Rock's thirst as an excuse to stop into the bar.

That's where he met the man who promised him something better then what any drug dealer could offer.

The man identified himself as Matthews and he offered to buy Rock anything he wanted from the bar's menue which was specifically for the human slaves.

Karofsky hesitated, but in the end agreed to let the stranger waste his money. What did he care?

It wasn't until after the food had arrived that Matthews asked Karofsky if he wanted to move to a more private section of the bar.

Karofsky knew this to be a bit foolish, but he agreed to the idea and they were soon sitting down at a booth in the back of the establishment.

"So what brings you here, my friend? Are you looking for a job?"

Karofsky's eyes narrowed, "What do you care?"

"I was only curious. I'm sort of hiring right now and it looks like you could use a well-paying job."

"What sort of job?"

"A good one," Matthews smiled, "though I'm afraid you can't be squimish if you accept the offer."

"Squimish about what?"

"Blood and death."

"You an assassin or something?"

Matthews raised an eyebrow, "My dear man, assassin is such a negative term. This is more then just a killer-for-hire type of thing."

"Why would you offer me anything? I don't even know you."

"No, but you look a bit down on your luck right now and those tend to be the kind of people I hire. The ones who have nothing to lose."

Karofsky glanced at Rock who had been growing more and more tense as the converstaion progressed.

"Oh don't worry about your slave," Matthews said, catching his look. "We'll make sure he's never near any of your jobs."

"What one of the jobs backfire and he's left alone?"

Matthews shrugged, "Draw up a will and I'll see to it that it's followed. Now, do we have a deal?"

Karofsky stuied the man as he weighed his options. He could either go to the drug dealer--a dangerous choice--or he could be paied for killing people. Another dangerous choice.

He glanced at Rock who was carefully avoiding eye contact with him, then back up at Matthews. He considered saying 'no' and leaving the stranger with the bill.

Considered it; didn't say it.
////
"That was horrible," complaied Blaine.

"The bandages are tight enough, honey."

"Sorry," Blaine apologized, loosening the gauze around Kurt's arms a little. "Is that better?"

Kurt nodded, "Yeah."

They had just finished with their first client and Blaine was still fuming from the ordeal. He had hated sinking that knife blade into Kurt's perfect skin and then rubbing the live-giving liquid into the clien't back.

The pervert had kept shooting Kurt suggestive glances all throughout the session. After the massage the pervert had even gone so far as to propose Blaine rent Kurt out on the side.

It had taken all of Blaine's self-control not to rip the bastard's throat out. He had punched him though and Tammy was forced to vouch for Blaine, stating that he was provoked.

"Are you sure you can keep doing this?" Kurt asked quietly, resting a hand on Blaine's.

"I don't have much of choice right now."

"Well you might not have to be here for much longer," Tammy said, coming into the break room. "Pearlman's secluded a meeting for his little gang a week from now and he's asking for a masseur."

Blaine's eyes flicked to Kurt, gauging his reaction. There was a slight tightening around the human's eyes, but other then he gave nothing away.

"Good," said Kurt, "the sooner we get this over with the better."

"I still don't get how this is supposed to help you overthrow the king," said Sabrina.

"If we can get Pearlman on tape revealing his plans to assassinate the king we can show it to his highness and then offer him protection," explained Blaine.

"Hopefully being protected by a bunch of humans and werewolves will change his mind about our social standing and we can negotiate with him about giving us our freedom back," finished Kurt.

Sabrina didn't looked entirely convinced, "Well good luck with that."

Presently, Blaine's phone buzzed and he snatched it up off the table.

"Jeremiah," he said before pressing talk.

There was a short pause as Blaine listened to the other vampire.

"Okay, we'll be there right away."

He pressed end and stuffed the phone back in his pocket.

"We need to get back to base," he told Kurt. "Something's happened."

"Oh God, is everyone okay?"

"At the moment, but I'm not sure how much longer it will last. I'll explain on the way."

Kurt and Blaine stood up and shrugged on their coats.

"Can you cover for us?" Blaine asked.

Tammy nodded, "I'll tell them Kurt--or Crow--had a fainting spell and needs time to recover. Happens a lot with first timers so it won't reflect badly on you."

"Thank you."

With that, human and vampire headed out of the club.
////
Jeremiah couln't belive what he was seeing.

Count Jesse St. James and one of the ex-Dalton Coven members were leading a group of vampires down the tunnel that led to the rest of the base.

He had managed to get a hold of Shelby and explained the situation to her. She quickly sent out a message to one of the units close by the airport and delivered the news that the guards on the plane had been slaughtered.

Three guesses by who.

Jeremiah's own gaurds were barricading the door into the base and were standing ready and waiting with their guns.

Jeremiah phoned Blaine and told him to call once they were across the street from the base.

He had been counting the minutes when his phone buzzed and caller ID told him it was his old lover.

'Okay, Jeremiah, Kurt and I are here. What do you need us to do?'

"If you could create a deverstion of some kind, that would be much apprciated. It doesn't have to be big or anything, just enough so that they're distracted."

'Where are they anyway?'

"In the tunnel."

There was a brief pause, 'Okay, we'll see what we can do.'

The line was disconnected and Jeremiah shoved the phone back in his pocket.

He turned his attention back to the video monitors to see that the opposing group were nearly to the door.
////
"But I thought it was supposed to erase the memories of outsiders," Kurt said as they stood outside of the hole in the floor that led to the tunnel.

"Maybe it malfunctioned."

"Yeah, maybe. What are we going to do?"

Blaine licked his lips, "I have an idea, but it's stupid and dangerous."

"How stupid and how dangerous?"

"We light something on fire and throw down into the tunnel."

"That bad, hu?"

"Can you think of anything else? I mean, I don't really want to wait until the werewolves show up for backup, do you?"

"Not really, no. But the fire could spread into the base."

"I thought of that. But not if it's small enough to be tramped out by the intruders running over in their haste to get back up here."

Kurt considered Blaine's idea for a few minutes.

"Sounds good, but I would like to make an adjustment to it if you don't mind."

"Sure. What is it?"
////
Sebastain was giddy with happiness as they reached the door to the base.

It had been easy enough to disable to the device that should have erased their memories and the idiots had not taken any precautions regaurding the tunnel.

This was going to be way too easy.

It was right after thinking this that he smelled smoke.

He and the other vampires paused, looking over their shoulders at the thick cloud of smoke filling the tunnel.

Sebastian's eyes began to water and he yanked his shirt collar up over his nose and mouth so he wouldn't choke.

The tunnel was filled with sounds of coughing as the rest of the party began to succumb to the smoke. The vampires in front, Sebastain among them, began ramming their shoudlers into the door to try and break the thing down.

Pretty soon the tunnel was filled with dark, black smoke and it rendered the vampires unable to function as it got into their lungs and made it impossible to breath.

They soon realized that the door was not about to give under their abuse which left them with only one option--get out of the tunnel.

It was a mad dash back up the surface as the group tripped over both themselves and each other.

Sebastian was sure there would be curses coming from each of them if the smoke made it possible for them to talk.

They burst out of the tunnel only to find that the smoke did not get much better in the warehouse. There were green sticks and twings blocking the door, enough to cause a great smokescreen in the building.

Sebastian looked around wildly for a window to break, but to his dismay, found none.

Two shadowy figures stood right behind the burning sticks and he blinked away tears as he tried to focus on them.

He could hardly believe it. Anderson and his fuck-toy were standing there, gazing solemly at the invaders.

He would have screamed at them if he could.

Suddenly he heard the sound of marching boots on the pavement and saw Anderson and the human glance to the right before looking in on the invaders again.

About thirty armed figures came into view.

Water was poured over the sticks and the smoke died with a hiss, white clouds replacing the black smoke.

The werewolf gaurds jumped over the sticks and wrestled each of the vampires into handcuffs. As an extra precaution, the werewolves marched behind the vampires, gun barrels pointed at their heads.

As they were manhandled out of the warehouse, Anderson stopped the werewolf who had ahold of Sebastain.

"I wish to speak to this one if you don't mind."

The werewolf nodded and stood aside as her fellow gaurds hauled the rest of the vampires into an armored truck.

Anderson turned to Sebastain with a steely look in his eyes.

"You want to see the inside of the base so badly, Smyth? Let's go see it then."

Sebastian only glared at him as Anderson and his slave pulled their shirts up over their nose and mouth and led the way into the tunnel.
////
Matthews couldn't belive the indignation of having the lowly massur punch him in the face.

He knew how possive some vampires could be of their slaves, but that was almost too possive. It's not like he had asked to drink the kid's blood, he just wanted to fuck him.

He entered Pearlman's house still in a bad mood. Taking his usual place by the window, he tried to calm his mind before the meeting started.

Like everyone else, he stood up when Pearlman and 'the Serpent' entered the living room.

As Pearlman passed by him, the eyes of his suprior flashed with sudden recognition.

Pearlman whipped around and stared at him, wide-eyed.

"What is it, sir?"

"You have the scent of a human on you."

"Yeah, I got a massage before coming. Why?"

"No, but that particular scent...it's very familier to me."

Matthews shrugged, "Maybe you've had him before."

"Oh I think I have...in more ways then one."

Matthews frowned, "I don't know about that, sir. The guy's master doesn't seem like to the type to share."

Pearlman considered him for a few more seconds before nodding.

"No, I should think not."

There was a brief puase in which nobody moved.

Then Pearlman grinned as if at a private joke.

"Ah well, it doesn't really matter."

He took up his chair and everyone else sat down.

"Before we begin, let me start by saying that I've just changed the place of our next meeting. We'll be going to the Club Blood of All next Wendsday."